Perihelion
by Elfreida
Summary: He's besotted. But being in love with his god-sister is the least of Ted's worries as they are spirited back in time to collide with the lives of their parents twenty years before. Undoubtedly an opportunity presents itself - but should they take it? And how will being exposed to the past affect all their lives? Under the threat of the death eaters, both must find their courage...
1. Past Prologue

**Perihelion**

_**Or the Lion, the Wolf and the Temporal Mechanics Student**_

_**Past Prologue**_

Her eyes were like pearls of the North Sea, shining in the last light. He stood by her side and held her hand, and they watched the waves break in the surf. Her tears glittered. There would be a storm soon. But the warmth of the summer burned out to them over the water: a beacon of molten gold. In it were being melted entire pallets of red and orange, fringed with delicate brushes of pinks and purples. Perfect as one of Constable's paintings.

He had cried too. Hours ago now, but as they stood resolute he felt the seemingly inexhaustible reservoir rise once more. There were so many to cry for; so much to say, to lament, to mourn, yet he had said only little at the time. He'd spoken and wept, and then there was nothing left to do but go home. Perhaps have a cup of tea, or one of Mrs Weasley's left-over biscuits.

But _she_ was always there. She hadn't left his side. They had kissed, just once or twice when they'd seized a moment alone, but mostly it was the simple act of being together.

It made all the difference.

She breathed out a sob. He drew his arm around her, resting his cheek on her red, red hair. There they stood, just them, the world laid out beneath their feet. Behind them was Shell Cottage, a brief reminder of the rest of the universe, but for now it was just _them_.

Like standing on the edge of the world.

"_How long are you going to stay?"_

She'd asked two months ago. He'd stayed at the Burrow at first – they all had. Each was starved of the joy of each other's company, bound by their grief for those they'd lost. They had buried the dead, then, slowly, they'd drifted their separate ways. Percy went back to living in his apartment in London. Charlie went home, as did Luna and Neville, citing vows to write one another the _instant_ they got there. Bill and Fleur went back to living in Shell Cottage. Then there was him. He'd been at a loss.

What happened next?

What _could_ happen next, now that it was all done?

Hermione had announced one afternoon that she was going to go and bring her parents back. That had led to much discussion – logistics and fussing and particulars – but in the end he'd decided not to go with them. Ron had objected. He had sadly shaken his head. They needed the time to themselves for once; anyone could see that. He'd felt old. _Tired._

He'd stared at nothing for uncounted time.

Then she'd come in: beautiful, graceful; undemanding. She had taken him into her arms and he'd stayed there. He fell asleep at some point during that long embrace, only to wake on top of soft sheets, her body entwined with his. He watched her doze, hair fluttering over her shirt, and he'd smiled.

Just smiled.

The next day she suggested going to Bill and Fleur's. Mrs Weasley had objected, of course – and it hurt to leave George on his own, Merlin knew it did, but she'd won them over in the end. Something about 'fresh air'?

"_How long are you going to stay?"_

The light was getting redder. Like a dying flame, bleeding into the sea. The thought of leaving – _he didn't want to leave. Where would he go?_ Because, if he went _somewhere_, would she be there? And he was struck suddenly with the thought of how uncertain things were. In life, in death; on the paths in between…

Of the wide world and all its wonders, subtle and terrible. And what of the 'could have been'? Of all the _'what if'_s and _'might have'_s, the world was full of _'if I could go back…' _

And there were whole stories that could be made of the moments they lost to the dusky wind.

"Marry me."

"What?"

"I'm serious." He turned to her, wonder in his eyes.

"But, Harry –"

"Look I know it's sudden, and I know it's totally _mental_, but, well…"

"Harry…we're only just out of school – we haven't even got our NEWTS yet. We're too…too…"

"Young?"

"Yeah. And I mean, do you…are…are you saying you –"

"Yes." He was almost breathless admitting it. "Always."

She let out a nervous laugh.

"You sure?"

His arms brought her to him, and their lips met with the sunset behind them, silhouetting them in the fire. She lost herself in that kiss, breathing it in as if it was her last breath on earth. When they parted, he gazed at her. And she gazed at him. He held her close and let her see the truth in his eyes: his fear, his need, his longing. He saw something reflected back and his breath hitched.

"I don't want you to go." She whispered, tears sliding slowly down her cheeks. "I don't ever want you to go."

"I just…I mean…_anything_ could happen. Even without…" he let the thought hang. The shadow was still too close. "I just want to do this before we lose anyone else."

He was more certain than he had ever been of anything. She traced her fingertips down from his jaw, a smile playing her damp lips. And there they stood in the silent noise of the world; the hum of insects, and of the sea, and the soughing of the grass and the sand beneath their feet. The light faded on the two figures, yet still they stood, unyielding to the sorrows that stalked the night. He thought her hair looked like the sunset; her eyes like the waves.

Then there was a cry from inside the house, and the spell broke. They could hear Fleur shushing the clumsy Teddy, cooing him with her lyrical voice. She was almost three months gone herself. His eyes strayed back to the woman before him. She watched the smile spread across his face: that grin she'd fallen in love with over and over.

"Marry me?"

"Yes."

* * *

_**A.N: So, it's that time of year again - I re-visited this from last year and this is my first re-edit from the original (though I did edit this prologue quite extensively the first time round). Did a bit of tweaking, mainly some grammatical adjustments and changes to the emphasising features (re-distribution of italics and ellipsises and the clauses in sentences). Just mucking about, really, polishing and checking for errors; ensuring the text flows properly.**_

_**I have thought about changing "Pearls of the North Sea" because it's too flowery, but to be honest I'm rather attached to the expression and so left it in (sorry!). The big thing I've changed has been "he had" to "he'd". Just sounded better and caused the pace to be less draggy. I added a couple of lines and cut some short.**_

_**As always, my dear readers, will appreciate any thoughts on the matter!**_

_**P.S: The original inspiration was Constable's paintings of the sky, they're absolutely amazing! Also, I'll note it here, I'm taking Ginny's eye colour from Bonny Wright (who portrayed Ginny beautifully in the movies) rather than the books where they're brown. Just so you know. **_


	2. When The Levee Breaks

_Right: AU of the epilogue. Harry and Ginny marry young and end up having kids that are only a couple of years younger than Teddy Lupin, who I've set here as nearly Seventeen. Rather than having Lily as the youngest, then Albus, then James, I've set Lily and James as twins with Albus as the youngest. Clear so far? Also, I've jumbled about appearances so that James has red hair and Lily and Albus swap eye colours. Just cos.  
_

_Additionally: the cannon is cherry-picked from the books and movies with a bit of artistic licence had in between. Nothing too major._

_Additionally, additionally: apparently it's not entirely cannon for Ted to be a werewolf, making this a werewolf!Ted fic (apparently). Don't know if his full name's Theodore either...never mind. Just bear with me. It's just a story._

_Yes this is a time-travel!next gen, if the blurb didn't already give it away. No this is not Mary Sue. Not to the best of my ability to actually design genuine characters and write a good story, anyway._

_So...ONWARD!_

_DISCLAIMER: This fic is not owned and does not make profit from the Harry Potter franchise. It has not been distributed outside the legal jurisdiction of this site and any and all use of the franchise's features, characters, plot and/or copyrighted content is for personal and pan-social use only. This is why it is referred to as a 'fanfiction'._

_WARNINGS: Angst, bit of blood, swearing and minor drug use._

**Chapter One**

_**When the Levee Breaks**_

"Theodor, I ought to disown you!"

"You know, Lily, you're the only person who _ever_ calls me Theodor," the pale youth looked up from his ocean of parchments. "And only when you're really annoyed, so I'm going to assume I've done something…amiss?"

"It's Sunday!"

"It is?"

He looked at his watch.

"So it is. Why?"

"It's _Sunday _and it's _beautiful outside_ and you're _studying!_"

"Well it's alright for you!" Ted swung his head up in annoyance. "_Fourth year!_ You haven't got a bloody mountain of 'why manipulating incorporeal magics in limited spatial fields is so difficult' to hand in on Wednesday!"

"But…_but_ –"

"Lily!"

He hadn't meant to snap. He hadn't meant to growl either. The sudden look of hurt in her bottle-green eyes was enough to make him want to drown himself – worse when she suddenly turned and fled the common room. But he had, in fact. The flash of her brilliant red hair burnt itself onto his memory like a candle in a dark room. Inside, a voice screamed at the rest of him for being so thoughtless – _for daring to make her upset._ Was she crying? _No, she's stronger than that. Stupid. Why do I always have to shout at her? It's never James – _

Though, if he thought about it, he was probably yelling at the mischievous little git every other day. It wasn't the same, though. She didn't deserve to always get the brunt of his anger. _He could never do anything right by her._ There were days over the summer where he wished with all his heart that he could just make her smile…

_Oi! Stop that! She's practically your sister you sick, sick bastard! _

Head falling into his hands, he let out a strangled moan of despair. When the _hell _had he let it happen?

"You alright, mate?"

"Wha – oh, yeah fine."

"You sure? You look a bit pale. Then again, I suppose it's your time of the month again…"

"Dom." He said softly.

"Hey," Dominic suddenly came round so he could look Ted in the eye. "Something's bothering you."

"It's nothing."

"Well, obviously it's something."

"Just drop it Dom!"

"The potions are still working, aren't they?"

"More or less, yeah."

It was the automatic response: honesty, falling off his tongue as easily as air. Dominic stared for a full few seconds before Ted realised and kicked himself. As his best friend's face contorted, Ted wondered briefly which conversation he wanted to avoid more.

"More or less?"

"Keep it down, would you."

"_More or less?_"

"Dom, it's fine! I'm fine! It's…not a problem."

"Not a problem? Ted if you can't control your mind properly any more, I'd say that's a pretty big fucking problem!"

"Dom!"

They had earned some increasingly dubious looks from the girls in the corner. Ted waved mechanically, a very toothy false smile making him feel unnaturally creepy.

"It's not worse than usual." He hissed through gritted teeth. Dominic didn't look reassured.

"And how is it usually?"

"_Usually_ I can, well…stop. Step back in."

He let his head fall back into his hands. Yes, he had control. The potions still worked and he _had control_. Calloused skin pressed into his eyes, making them bloom green and purple. He pressed further, and pain shot through them. He shuddered.

"Ted…" The lanky Dominic had moved around the table to sit beside him. A hand dropped gently to his back, rubbing him between the shoulder blades.

"How long's this been going on?"

"The potions never _really_ worked properly. That's the truth, I don't know why." He sighed and leant slowly back into the sofa. "It's probably got something to do with _It_ being…genetic, I suppose. But they always _sort of_ worked, I just took more. And since then it's just been a progressively higher dosage."

Dominic's hand spasmed. He looked away, reeling from the sudden truth.

"And," he said slowly. "Because it didn't work properly to begin with, you're just delaying the inevitable?"

"Yeah. Pretty much."

"Exactly how much of the stuff do you have to take?"

Ted grimaced and closed his storm-grey eyes.

"Well, let's see: I started taking more over the summer, and then again over Christmas, so now…most of a cauldron full."

"But," Dominic stared at him in disbelief. "But, Ted, it's got aconite in it!"

"Most people would think that was the point of a 'wolfsbane' potion."

"It's not called 'wolfsbane' for nothing!"

"I'm fine, Dom." But he was even less convincing this time. In fact he felt terrible, as if his body was anticipating the final bout poison he was about to subject it to. And that was sans the change –

"I knew you were having a harder time of it, but…" His friend trailed off, shaking his head. He looked upset. "How long do you think you can keep going like this?"

"Long enough."

"Ted –"

"Long enough!"

"Eventually it's going to kill you." Ted snapped up to look at him. "You know that right?"

"_I know!_"

His breath came in short, painful gasps as he fought the surge of aggression. It poured like molten metal through his veins; his head, his throat. Vile, _terrible._ _Unbearable_. He clenched his fists and tensed so badly he could feel cramp twisting up his legs. Dominic was muttering something next to him, the first hand massaging insistently whilst the other moved to his shoulder. He curled in on himself, eyes shut, and tried to ride it out.

It hadn't always been so bad, though he had to remind himself that. The truth was that he had been fine most of his life. It'd sufficed to have just a bit more than was usually necessary, and he had been able to live a normal life.

Well, as normal as you can get when you're a metamorphmagus werewolf with more than a little talent for the magical arts. Or when you're an orphan to two war heroes and your godfather's one of the most famous wizards who ever lived.

He felt a sudden pang when he thought of Harry. Of the terms they'd parted on after Christmas. It had been so…needless. The words; the anger. He had vented all his pain and frustrations on the man who had been nothing if not a father to him since before he could remember. And the worst bit was Harry was only trying to help, to chide him into accepting the truth. Because he couldn't go on like this, deep down he knew it, but that didn't stop him clawing at the promise of _control _with everything he had.

_If only_…suddenly he thought of Lily and how he wished it were her beside him, comforting him. _Her hand; her voice…_

_You sick bastard!_

"Ted!"

The shout took him by surprise. It was like being drenched in cold water. He met his friend's eyes in confusion, before realising that they were not fixed on him, but on a point past his lap. On his hand.

He froze.

Horror crystallised his insides as he raised and opened his fist, watching with morbid fascination as the claws receded, leaving only the blood that poured down his arm.

"Okay, upstairs, now!"

Dominic virtually had to pick him up, half carrying, half dragging Ted up the staircase. When they reached the seventh-year dorm, he rushed around to check there was no-one there. Only when he was satisfied they were alone did he shut the door sharply and make for the water jug on the window sill. Ted just sank numbly onto his bed.

_I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm okay – _

"Okay, I'll clean this out and get you some bandages." Dominic muttered as he brought the jug. "Ted?"

The werewolf stared unblinkingly at his hand. It was if he could see the bones writhing beneath the skin, just waiting to move; _to splinter_. When he still didn't answer, Dominic bustled past him to get a towel. Their eyes met just briefly as he knelt into Ted's line of sight – enough for Ted to see the pain and worry Dominic felt for him. He bore it so readily that Ted wondered how he could ever have kept the secret of his troubles from him. For now, though, the eyes that were akin to the wood of the four-poster were still hard with alarm.

And Ted could hardly blame him. He felt self-revulsion filter through. He always carried some, like a guilty hip flask, but now it flooded him like paralysing venom. He sat quietly as his best friend washed out the deep cuts in his palm and bound them in muslin. They couldn't be healed by magic, not the claws of a werewolf. He would heal more quickly than most people – a good deal more quickly – but in the meantime there wasn't much to be done. Not for _these _kinds of wounds.

When Dominic had finished, he sat back on his haunches and watched Ted intently. Ted refused to meet his eye.

"Ted?"

He turned to the side, thoughts spinning in circles like a cracked merry-go-round.

"That's not happened in a while."

"It's not your fault."

_Not my fault? Not my fault when the monster's _bursting_ through me?_

"How can you –"

"_Don't_ do this to yourself." Dominic's voice was firm, despite how shaken he was. "You're _better_ than this, and it's just because it's today, right? You've got _nothing_ to be ashamed of."

"Dom…"

"You'll get through this."

Ted shut his eyes and tried to clear the way his ears rang. Now the shock was wearing off, his hand throbbed horribly, sending needles all the way up his arm. Unbidden, his uninjured hand ghosted towards his trouser pocket where he kept a photo of his parents. It had been taken perhaps a year before he was born, somewhere in the Lake District. The willows were swaying in the breeze and both of them were waving eagerly at the camera. He suspected it had been taken just after they'd married because his father was grinning madly and his mother looked so completely contented standing beside him.

"Ted look at me."

He raised his eye slowly to meet his friend's gaze.

"You'll get through this."

* * *

It was the stress. It had to be. How Harry and his friends had ever found time to save the world, he would never know. He tried to relax as best he could, get through the day without any more incidents – finish his research assignment – but somehow the tension never dissipated. He found James near Hagrid's hut late in the afternoon trying to charm the scarecrow. The result was a cabbage aimed at his head.

"Very mature." He called dryly after deflecting it with a shredding spell.

"What did you say to Lily?"

"I didn't say anything!" He threw up his arms in despair. "I didn't mean to be hostile, I just –"

"Lost it, yeah?" The boy had hair as red as his twin. "What did you do to your hand?"

"Nothing."

He sat dejectedly in the pumpkin patch, waving away the crows that scattered at his approach. His eyes strayed to the forest. It loomed darkly, forbidding as its namesake. Hard to believe he had once looked forward to loping among the boughs; the exhilaration of muscle rippling beneath him, the wind in his fur. Tonight, it would be nothing less than a waking nightmare.

James frowned as he put the finishing touches on his enchantment.

"You gonna be okay tonight?"

Ted nodded glumly. He was always okay, he was always _fucking_ okay. He might have his body ripped apart and put back together with spit and baling wire only to run around the whole night as a barely contained monster, but he was certainly _okay_. His would-be-brother sidled over, glare softening to something like pity.

"You're going to have to say sorry to her." He said quietly.

"She's been avoiding me all day." Ted responded hopelessly. "If I could find her for two minutes..."

James nodded, mirroring Ted's doleful expression. They sat in companionable, if melancholic, silence while the shadows lengthened.

"What's the scarecrow going to do?"

"Ah," James brightened with a trademark grin. "I've got it so it's only going to move when someone _isn't_ looking. It's gonna follow you round and sort of _leer_ over – always at a distance, of course – but as soon as you look," he brought his hand down in a slice. "Nothing. And every time you turn round, it'll be there staring at you. Can't wait to see Al's face!"

Ted shook his head with a chuckle.

"You know, sometimes I can't decide whose worse: you or peeves."

"I'll take that as the highest compliment!" The red-head beamed with pride.

"What happens when there's more than one person?"

"Hmm," James looked at his masterpiece thoughtfully. "First target?"

They laughed together, momentarily forgetting their litany of problems. Finally, James announced that he was going to get in a bit of flying before dinner and left Ted alone with the straw man. He wondered where Hagrid was – probably in the forest tending one of its many beasts. In fact, worrying though it was, he'd probably forgotten it was full moon and that he ought to be wary of the adolescent werewolf soon to be thrashing around in there.

He sighed. It was still a few hours until moonrise. Enough time to check everything was in place, grab dinner, re-assure Dominic and haul himself into the forest with time to spare. He would take the seventh dose of potion – the last of the week preceding the change – under the shadow of the trees. He'd originally done it in the dorms, though, as it turned out, it became harder to be surreptitious when taking _several_ bottles. After some _fairly _awkward questions, he'd just given up and taken them with him in the overnight bag.

The bag also had bandages, antiseptic salves, a change of clothes, a towel, pepper up potion and a couple of other items for emergencies. These included a huge blanket which, after a memorable episode back in fifth year, Dominic had insisted he add instead of _"shivering like a bleeding leaf all the way back to the goddam__ hospital wing." _There were also stitches and an extendable splint.

The last item in the bag he had never used...and hoped to god he never had to. Although after the incident in the common room, he couldn't help but dwell on its ominous presence. It was a large, unbreakable amulet kept in a colourless glass bottle. The chain was long enough to hang to his chest, even as a wolf, and the pendant was even fashioned into a likeness. But in truth he only needed one touch from the thing for the effects to be felt.

Hence why he kept it in a bottle.

In theory, if touched while in the wolf-skin, the amulet would completely reverse the change in a matter of minutes. Unfortunately it would also put him in a coma, so potent the magics were to his body. It had been out of curiosity when he'd touched it before. He was thirteen. And he'd been in in human form, so they could never quite figure out whether the experimental device _would've_ worked or not. He'd still been affected by the magics, though. They nearly killed him – would've killed him if Harry had not been so quick to react.

Pushing down another wave of guilt, he stumbled to his feet and made to go back to the castle. With any luck, he would find Lily and get the weight off his chest before he transformed. And then…

He felt bilious. Not excessively, but enough to make him wonder about dinner. From experience, he knew he'd feel worse if he didn't have it, but what with the potions, he had doubts on whether he'd be able to keep it down.

He grimaced as he trudged across the lawns.

Albus caught him near the Fat Lady. The first year was panting as if he'd run all the way up the stairs.

"Dom said you're still using the potions!"

Ted cursed inwardly.

"You're not supposed to be still on the potions!"

"Look, Al…"

"Dad said – "

"Yeah, well, your dad's not always right about everything." He said curtly. Albus looked stung and Ted winced.

"Is that what the big argument was all about?"

"Just leave it. Please." He said softly.

"No!"

Ted spun back. The lad was tiny compared to him – six foot at only _just_ seventeen was something he was quite proud of – yet the way the eleven-year-old Albus stood with his chin stuck out, undaunted, was something to admire. His messy black hair and round glasses made him look almost identical to his father. Except for the eyes. The eyes he shared with James: a soft, liquescent blue; exactly like his mother's.

_The universe was apparently an ironic bitch._

Right now they were scrunched with concern. Doing his utmost to keep his emotions firmly in check, Ted sighed heavily and knelt down to the eleven-year-old. Time was when he would have made his hair flash a different colour, or sprouted tentacles. The expression on their youngest's face was always priceless, diffusing any argument. But it wasn't something Ted had done in a while, and he didn't feel like starting it up again now.

"Look, I know this isn't…ideal, but –"

"You look awful." Albus said bluntly. Ted fell silent. He couldn't dispute that, not with how his skin felt _thin_ and his eyes _bruised._

_How is it Albus always managed to catch the truth everyone else avoided?_

He said nothing, not even trying to hold back the grimness he felt. The kid looked heart-wrenchingly sympathetic.

Ted sighed once again, then yanked himself back together. This was no time to have a break-down. He needed to be on form.

"We'll talk about this later, yeah?" He promised earnestly. Albus suddenly looked at the dusk out of the window and stiffened, nodding fearfully.

_He's right to be afraid. _

He stood, forcing a smile, and shoed Albus into the common room, pulling his bag behind his back. He still hadn't found Lilly. He was half tempted to run around for a bit longer to find her, but the longer he waited the more dangerous it was. So, resignedly, he wended back down and out the entrance hall doors, careful all the while of who saw him.

The night deepened as he crossed the grounds. Shadows fell coal-black against the damp grass: spirits both beautiful and grotesque. All around him, the sounds of the night rose like bats from the roost; clicks and rustles and calls, bathing him in a thousand unseen lives.

_Soon to welcome him among them._

It had been an endearing thought when he was little. Harry had made sure to tell him that it was not a curse, but a rare gift to become part of nature's ensemble. And he had relished the freedom it brought: the wolf with the mind of man and a child's imagination. It was serenely beautiful Ginny said, and she'd meant it, because she'd cried at the time. It was one of his earliest memories.

Yet now, he felt like a demon among God's creatures – not that he took store in such things, but he felt _wretched. Tainted. _The monster that prowled the edges of the darkness.

It grew colder as he passed into the deep gloom beneath the trees, the night seeping damply into his skin. He shivered, picking his path carefully. It was almost pitch black, difficult to see even with his enhanced vision, but he had learned the way well enough over the years. He felt rather than saw the boles of the forest grow in girth and size until they dwarfed any normal person's conception of a tree. They were old – how old, no one was quite sure. The forest dated back to the time of Hogwarts' founding, yet the histories said it was there long before that. The acres it spanned were once part of an immense blanket of greenery stretching darkly as far as the eye could see. It now stood the last relic of that ancient wood. To make matters more interesting, no-one knew quite how big the Forbidden Forest was. One of the lesser known facets of it were the vast tracks of enchanted ground that warped normal space around them. There were places where the whole thing could be crossed in under half an hour. There were also places – or so it was rumoured – where it could easily take several days.

It wasn't so bad near the edges, and it was imperceptible whilst inside. The thought of being truly lost inside the enclosure of the wood, however, was a daunting thought.

Ted had only come across such oddities from old tomes and treatises when looking up the spells that caused them. He had coaxed Hagrid into telling him more of the phenomenon –which, as it turned out, was one of magic's great enigmas. Or, in other words, it was one of those 'nobody knows' conundrums. The beaming Groundskeeper had even taken him on a tour to some of the more undisturbed parts once or twice. He had the feeling, though, prickling at the back of his neck, that he had barely scratched the surface.

In flights of wild fancy, he supposed groves right at the forest's heart that had not seen the ruin of people since its founding. Old thickets of thousands of years past with trees that made even the ones he was under now look young and small. That there were creatures there that were long gone from the rest of the world; of natures both star-bright and immeasurably dark. Creatures of old legend, even to wizards.

Ancient evils.

As he walked, he couldn't help but wonder at the shadows that followed him.

At last, he settled back against the roots of a fig tree, the hollow they made between as tall as a cathedral. He checked his watch to make sure. He had ten minutes, give or take. A little more since he could hide in the trees' shadow for a time. As he dumped the bag, his eyes drew to the marginally lighter patch of ground fifty meters away. It marked an opening in the canopy where the moon would shine through.

He loosed a long breath. Bracing himself for a moment against the roots, he reached for the potions. As he downed each one in its entirety, he tried in vain to suppress his shudders of disgust. And then the urge to call it all back up again as a wave of sickening wooziness threatened to overwhelm him. Swaying dangerously, he gritted his teeth and was about to pour the last of the poison down his throat when a noise slipped out of the darkness behind him. If he were _normal_, he would likely not have heard it. But as it was his permanently sharpened senses and feather-strung nerves snapped to attention. He peered around the roots of the fig, sniffing the breeze for the tell-tale sign of an attacker.

Unfortunately, the wind wasn't in his favour and he could discern nothing. Whatever it was kept still as a mouse, remaining behind the impenetrable shadows as he peered into the dark. His instinct screamed that there was _something _– the silence that echoed was most definitely the silence-of-something-being-incredibly-quiet rather than the silence-of-nothing-there. The sense of being under threat, however, diminished as the seconds passed. The _something _remained, but made no further move.

After seven years' experience in the forest, Ted wasn't nearly foolish enough to think he had imagined it. There were far more manner of beasts than his limited knowledge could account for, most being harmless enough. _Harmless _being subjective – most were harmlessunless you were too stupid _not_ to walk up to them and poke them with a sharp stick. And then there were those that inevitably found him curious.

He decided it was probably nothing worth worrying about – _it_ would have a harder time eating him in about six minutes' time anyway, and _it_ probably knew that. He turned his back, marched back to the bag, and stripped down. The last of the winter cold snap nettled his bare skin, forcing him to shiver furiously as he fumbled to stow the clothes in his bag. Combined with the persisting dizziness, he felt like he had the flu. It was all he could do not to rip the garments out and shove them back on again. But magically mending things the following morning because he'd ripped through them whilst transforming was not something he really wanted to deal with.

He anxiously stamped his feet to get some feeling back in his toes. He had the disconcerting sense of being watched, the presence behind him suddenly apparent again. In the last few minutes, he wondered about that noise. It was by no means the strangest noise he'd ever heard out there in the forest, but it wasn't often it put him in mind of a sob…

* * *

"Lily, we have to do something!"

"Al?"

"He's gonna kill himself!" The young wizard was almost hysterical.

"And?"

Albus looked at his older sister like she had just announced she'd been born on another planet. His expression went from frantic to enraged; eyes wide, teeth bared. Had he not been deadly serious, it would have been almost comical to the red-headed fifteen-year-old girl.

_Had _he not been serious – and cruelly truthful.

"Why not just let him?" She bit out sourly, spitting out her anger to drown out the rising panic.

"Because he's our _brother!_"

"He doesn't seem to be under that impression."

"How can you _say _that?"

He was screaming now, and half the common room was listening, but Lilly barely noticed. The look in her brother's innocent, yet startlingly observant eyes seemed to rip a hole through her ill-forged armour. She felt her eyes stinging with bitter tears; her heart bound in the coils of a boa constrictor. The anger in Albus' face faded to despair.

"Has he already gone?" She tried to maintain her fury, but her voice cracked. Albus nodded, tears streaming down his cheeks. Everyone around them looked, bewildered, between them – except for Dominic, appearing through the portal with a look of anguish.

"There's nothing you can do." He said gently, kneeling down to Albus as Ted had done only minutes before. Lily heard the hopelessness even as he tried to keep it from his voice.

"There has to be something!"

"It's too late, we've done our bit." Dominic shook his head. "The best we can do for him now is get the hell out the way and wait 'till morning. We can deal with it then."

"And _if_ he ODs?"

"He's not that stupid, Lily."

Lily choked on something between a scoff and a sob.

"Look, if he had a death wish, don't you think we would have known about it by now?"

"Depends what you define as a 'death wish'."

"Lily!"

"_Dom!_"

Her ears registered how childish she sounded. She _wasn't_ going to cry! At her words, Albus let out a whimper like a whiplash, splitting her heart open like exotic fruit. _Fuck, _she chanted silently as she backed away. _Fuck fuck fuck fuck –_

"Lilly?"

"Where's James?"

"Haven't…seen him?"

Alright, she'd just have to do it without the cloak. Why _he'd_ gotten their father's legendary invisibility cloak, she'd never know – especially considering she was the elder, albeit by a few minutes. Something about it being passed father-to-son?

Just blatant bloody sexism.

"Lily, there's nothing you can do. _And _he'd never forgive me if I let you do something stupid."  
"Me? Do something stupid?" She quipped innocently. "_Whatever_ gave you that idea?"

"Lily, for god's sake!"

"You _ought_ to be worried about James, if you haven't seen him!"

"I haven't _seen him_ to _tell him _yet!"

"He's probably still _guessed_, though!"

"Fine! I'll find James." Dominic gave her a hard glare in the middle of hugging a trembling Albus to his chest. "Happy?"

"Yeah!" She turned on her heel and stormed up the girl's staircase. Her head was spinning. The panic kept rearing out of the pits of her stomach as if picking the right moment to tear through her. Out of habit, she ran a hand over the turn-table that lay on her bed-side table. It doubled as an alarm, enchanted to play whatever vinyl happened to be there, although she usually had classical music in the mornings. The needle moved smoothly without ever blunting or juddering, the fine clockwork and magics quite the most beautiful and intriguing thing she owned.

At the moment, however, as she moved the needle into place and punched the switch, she was just glad for the record there.

_Led Zeppelin. Mother Ship._

Some people might have found it odd that Lily Luna Potter, born and raised in the wizarding world, had a taste for muggle music. Odder still, that her tastes comprised bands whose heydays were over forty – and in this case over fifty – years past. She would laugh and say that there was more variety in the archives of muggle music than could be dreamt of by most wizard artists. Those that dismissed it were almost as foolish as those that dismissed technology.

'_If it keeps on raining, levee's gonna break._'

Her mind stilled for a moment. She sank into the rhythmic beats and thrumming guitar, her green eyes shut; nothing but the music that sang through her bones.

'_If it keeps on raining, levee's gonna break._'

The eyes snapped. She moved, ripping open the large wooden footlocker at the end of her bed. Out came a warm jumper, walking boots and an energy potion that she downed in one. She knew too well that this would last all night, whatever the outcome.

'_Mean old levee, taught me to weep and moan._'

Dom didn't deserve her booting him away like that, he really didn't. The worst bit was that Ted, in the same situation, wouldn't have budged. He would have stood there like the cross between the stone wall and the mother chicken he was and set them right. Yet it was _Dominic_ that was there now, looking after them while Ted battled his self-pity. The fact that Dom had really gotten into taking care of them recently was only a reminder, _day after day_, of how distant Ted had become. _Their _Teddy: their Teddy Lupin, the bloke who was _always_ there, never giving up for anything or anyone. The man he'd grown into: stoic and remarkable. Dominic didn't deserve it, but he was part of her _abhorrence_ at Ted's absence.

'_Got what it takes to make a mountain man leave his home._'

The chest slammed shut.

'_Oh we-ell, oh we-ell, oh we-ell_.'

How wrong everything was. How _unfair_ it was. She felt anger burning bright through the bitterness that'd consumed her for months, and it was this that turned her guilt towards Dominic and how she'd treated him. Rather than towards what she was about to do.

* * *

After learning how to evade the detection of a werewolf, sneaking out of the common room was child's play. Even James didn't see, deep in conversation with Dominic as he was, and she didn't linger long enough for anyone to notice. Swift as a flame-haired shadow, she slipped through the castle and out into the grounds, breaking into a run over the lawns. There was no moon yet – thank god – and the tranquillity of the grounds at night sped past her as she raced for forest. She knew the path. If she hadn't, she didn't know what she would have done, but she moved with speed. The born grace of a dancer ensured nothing turned her feet, though she endeavoured to keep as quiet as the night itself.

More so as she drew deeper into its maw.

Unlike in the way Ted described it, the forest seemed hostile to her. Close and pressing, the darkness complete as it tried to corrupt her way. It made sense: no humans were welcome here, not in the depths of nature's halls. Not the burners and despoilers and plunderers. And she was _very _sure the forest had its own ways of protecting itself, given the chance. She was just fleeting, unseen as the wind; unheard as the owl.

She hoped, anyway.

After what seemed a worryingly long while, she could see the darkness thinning ahead, the familiar shadow of the fig silhouetted against it. She saw movement beside it and quickly stopped in her tracks. She'd been shrewd enough to approach it on the downwind side, but still she was shocked at how close she'd come to running right into him in the dark. Back tracking, she came around the tree to get a better view while staying to the deep shadows.

Not for the first time, the question of what she was actually going to do crossed into her mind. If she was trying to rationalise it, she would have described saving him from the creatures all too ready to take advantage. She would have discussed the proper methods of treating someone undergoing the effects of severe poisoning. She told herself how she would run to him, defend him against all the odds, and then kneel beside him when it was all over. Stroke his hair, hold his hand. Be there.

A warm feeling fluttered in her chest when she thought of this. No one else was brave enough – or mad enough – but she would be there. She would always be by his side, if she could help it.

Unfortunately, this was overshadowed by a much larger part of her that accused her of knowing nothing at all – in a loud voice. The loud voice also screamed at her about how _insanely stupid_ this all was.

_Who's the one's supposed to have the death wish? _It hissed savagely, _You or him?_

The dark figure moved haltingly. It tilted weirdly back; a movement that would have been inexplicable had she not seen the sharp glint of glass. Though she already knew, it was still horrifying to see him consume flask after flask of the foul stuff. When he stumbled back dizzyingly, she bit back a cry, thinking he would fall.

The figure froze.

Suddenly Lily's mind flooded with the thought of how angry he would be if he knew she was there. How hurt; how _betrayed_. And if he caught her, there was no time for her to go anywhere. She would have had to run as fast as her legs could take before the transformation completed. Abandon him, in other words. Beneath shadow of the giant trees, she felt hot tears streak down her face. In that moment she felt immeasurably small and naïve: a child, scared and alone, and she stayed as still as she could. For a whole minute, she didn't dare even breathe for fear it was as loud as a steam engine.

And then he was turning, turning away, sculling the last of the potion having decided she was nothing special. Her chest deflated slowly as she watched, disgusted with herself, but unable to do anything at all. What he did next didn't help matters.

It was dark as a cave where the smallest glow emanates through the entrance. And yet, she could still see him taking off all his clothes in the half light. If there had been light, she could have shown the world her fierce blush. _Of all the times –_ she wanted to look away, but found she couldn't for fear of missing something important. What little she could see of his pale skin was lean with muscle and compacted like a runner. He was thinner than she remembered, though; much thinner. And he was shaking violently, as well as swaying dangerously close to the ground as he stowed his things.

He was ill, that much was clear – how clear it would be to any predators lurking around remained to be seen. Lily quickly realised that he was in no fit shape to run, never mind fight, never mind endure the change…

She _tasted_ the microscopic shift in the air around her as the clearing flooded with light.

For a moment (mercifully with his back turned to her) Ted stood bathed in the cold illumination. To Lily, the image was not unlike the paintings of the elf kings of myth. He was beautiful and terrible, stood among the creatures of the wild; man, and not man, but fey like them.

She was transfixed. It was something she'd never seen before, and even much, much later she regarded it as a sight such as she would likely never see again. It seemed…suspended in time. Slowly, graceful as a deer and austere as a wolf, he looked back, moonlight running off his shoulders like the falls of _Imladris_.

For a split second, Lily thought he looked right back at _her_, their eyes locking over the distance. And in his she saw not an elven lord, fey and distant and magnificent, but just Ted. _Her _Theodore: terrified, awestruck, exasperated, brilliant, lonely –

The pupils swelled to saucers like black holes, the storm irises swallowed in a sudden amber-green. The whites were almost invisible in the new gaze. Lily trembled. For one reason or another, she had never once had cause to fear Ted. Oh, she was cautious of the wolf-skin, certainly, but never Ted and Ted was always behind the eyes. The creature that looked into her now, however…he looked into her, and she looked into him…

She searched for the familiar kindness, the tell-tale trace of humanity…and found only a hunter. _A carnivore._ Wild, untamed; a free thing of the deep night. Lordly among animals.

The wolf.

And _it_ still stared at her, piercing the darkness to where she crouched. It paused. It sniffed the air.

_I'm nothing, I'm nothing important,_ she pleaded silently, _I'm just a wisp, a waif passing through, I'm _nothing_._

Ted's face, familiar to her as her own, was that of a stranger – worse. It was as if her earlier musings about elf kings had leapt out of her nightmares. He was the most terrifying thing she had ever beheld.

And the most beautiful.

Her own thoughts ended as she tumbled into the universes hidden in that alien gaze. If he had asked to whisk her away to a realm of the faeries, she would have given him her heart without pausing to draw breath. And if he had borne down upon her –

All this happened inside the tick of a second, though it was true in the Forbidden Forest sometimes _time_ acted strangely as well. Lily could feel fresh tears, chillingly cold.

Then passed the next second.

The-thing-that-had-been-Ted suddenly went ridged and threw back its head to the sky, letting loose a blood-curdling howl in a shrieking tongue that was neither animal nor human; of fear and agony and hunger.

It had begun.

* * *

_**A.N: Bloody nora, going back over this gets tedious. But I'm happy. The most actual changes were:**_

_***Changing "Lilly" to "Lily" as per what it should've been (sorry about the misspelling guys)**_

_***Making Lily's reaction a bit less flouncy and a bit more bloody-minded and weary to Albus bursting into the common room. His reaction is unchanged in lieu of his age.**_

_***Making Ted's conversation with Albus a bit less abrupt by a few degrees; made him a bit gentler**_

_***Changing round a number of descriptive features to avoid overstating something or in order to achieve better clarity**_

_***Clipping sentences that either ended with something unnecessary (for instance "sidled over to sit down next to him" can be changed to just "sidled over" since the latter half is not needed and slows things down.**_

_***Correcting grammatical **_**_inconstancies and changing when things are emphasised_**

**_*Removing most instances of a word or phrase or clausal structure being repeated in the same paragraphal unit._**

**_P.S: 2nd part of First Total Edit (again, bloody nora...). But for first time readers: the song in the title was chosen for its obvious symbolic value and, as indicated in the fic, is one of Led Zeppelin's. This trend of a cameo song is one that will continue, and I think I rather like the idea. I've tried to chose well known songs, though, and none will be included in an intrusive way as it is one of my pet HATES in stories: the lack of an immidiately identifiable tempo makes it alien to the rest of the writing and, if it isn't an original piece of poetry, most pop songs lose a lot when sans the music. I mean a lot. So here I've tried to sort of integrate the lyrics of a classic rock song to make it work better :)_**

**_There's a lot of inspiration for the descriptions taken from both Terry Pratchett and J.R.R Tolkien with "Imladris" (the elvish name for Rivendell) a direct reference by Lily to the Lord of the Rings._**

**_OH - and the idea for the scarecrow came from the weeping angels!_**

**_Now, reviews precious, they make us so happy!_**


	3. Danse Macabre

_Okay, i changed the days of the week around so that the previous day was Sunday and the due date for the assignment was Wednesday, I just realised. Right, so here's the next bit.  
_

_Warning: more swearing. And a lot of angst._

* * *

**Chapter Two**

_**Danse Macabre**_

Everything was chaos. Lilly made a noise that was something like a half scream, but it didn't matter with the cries coming from the wolf. Released from her paralysis, she staggered backwards into a tree. Her mind was blank. She didn't even _begin_ to have a plan. All her instincts bellowed at her to run, but she didn't know where. Thoughts were useless, and the result was wasting precious seconds stumbling around in small circles like a dazed mongoose. She wanted to run to Ted, but even in her panicked state she knew _that_ was just _beyond_ insane. That was just suicide. And despite how much she wanted to go to him, she knew he would never forgive himself if he killed her.

She should have made a break for the castle, she _really _should have. She knew that. She also knew she should never have come, that Dominic had been right; that she should have just stayed the hell out of the way. That there was nothing she could do. But it was as if an invisible force was preventing her from leaving, gluing her to the shadows ringing the clearing. She could hear Ted's screams from where she stood – and it was him screaming. She could hear his voice trapped among the howls of the animal, suffering together. When she turned back, she saw them both writhing on the forest floor, bones splitting. The skin rendered, and then re-formed, horrific and fascinating at the same time. The hair on his scalp retreated to be replaced by thick fur, racing in a line down his spine before spreading over his limbs like butter.

_Okay, now_ _you should run._

She couldn't tear her eyes away.

_Yeah, really, _now _would be a good time!_

Her numb feet didn't want to obey. They stumbled back, taking her shivering with them, and then rammed abruptly into a root. With a whimpering yelp, she tried to grab something to steady herself, but found only leaves that flew from her hands. In a split second, she was tumbling spectacularly over her own ankles, landing with a crash.

_Get up, get up, get up, GET UP!_

She couldn't see a thing. Her eyes bloomed with a white fog as the screams died, replaced with a low growl. She kicked the floor, limbs tangling, flipping to her side. Now she was properly scared, every thought replaced with the endless chant: _GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT – _

She was crawling into the night, eyes screwed shut.

_GET UP FOR FUCK'S SAKE!_

But before she could even try, there was a sudden crashing of vegetation and she knew, right then, that she was dead.

* * *

Hours later, Ted found himself lying on soft sheets in the hospital wing, listening to the rain on the windows. His skin felt clammy, though Madam Pomfery said that was a side effect of the monkshood leaving his system. That he should feel fine in a day or two. He smiled wryly: she was getting to be quite a frail old lady now, if he really thought about it. But even that wasn't about to stop Poppy Pomfery being the most intimidating woman he knew.

The smile faded. He shut his eyes wearily and tried to drown out the memories of the previous night. Maybe, just maybe, if he could just ignore them for a time, they would go away –

As if on cue, the hospital doors flew open. He cracked his eyes open just a little, but the picture was blurry and hurt to look at so he gave up.

"Oh, my god!"

"He's not that bad, Rosie. Honestly, you make it sound like he's at death's door!"

"Yeah, well you didn't exactly help there, James."

Feet shuffled uncomfortably at the end of his bed. He kept his eyes brutally shut as the third speaker came round to his side, her soft hand on his arm. In his mind's eye, he tried in vain to shove the image of her terrified face from his sight.

"To be fair, he looked a lot worse when you brought him back this morning."

"Where's Dominic?"

"He's got class I think."

"So do we."

"Yeah, but I think he feels a bit guilty."

"Why?" Rose chimed in on his right.

"'Cos he wasn't the one rushing down to the forest at the crack of dawn." James said in a tone that was half amused, half exasperated. Ted felt a twinge of guilt.

"How _did_ you do that without anyone noticing, by the way?"

The hand on his arm stiffened.

"I mean, I asked Victorie and _she_ said she never saw you come up to bed."

"Dunno what you're talking about."

"I've always been better at lying than you have, Lil."

"Really," she said coolly. "Well, you're getting nothing else out of me."

"Look," Rose said hurriedly. "We should probably leave him to get some sleep."

James snorted.

"Oh, look at you Rosie, always the practical one."

"Hey," Ted could imagine the third year stood indignantly, bushy hair flicked back. "He's obviously exhausted and you two arguing isn't going to help!"

"Alright, alright," James sighed, making Ted wonder precisely how bad he did look. "Point taken. Let's go."

There was a pause while the hand stayed where it was.

"Lil?"

"I won't be a minute."

Ted listened for the sounds of the other two opening and closing the doors. Then they were alone in the white ward. The hand moved its slender fingers to poke him in the ribs.

"Right, you can stop pretending now." She said accusingly. The storm eyes flickered open.

"How are you feeling?"

"Been better."

And suddenly the guilt stabbed like a knife in his chest. It ripped through his heart as he met the eyes that were like the first spring leaves of a silver birch. His own fell to the sheets, burning with self-revulsion.

* * *

_He looked down at the pathetic creature, so small in so vast a realm, the muscle taught in his chest. He felt the teeth in his muzzle; imagined the sensation of her flesh as he tore at it, the glory of the kill. But even in the eye of the hunter, she was beautiful. She rolled to face him and he saw those eyes, framed by hair like wildfire. She was the intruder, the _thing_ – her smell alone told him that. And yet the wolf hesitated, for in her it could see the strains of something else and its obsession grew._

_Her alabaster features were warped with fear, but the last vestiges of sentience told him there was awe there also. A keener sense than sight told him of the power that thrummed beneath her skin, to him familiar and foreign, like an old friend. And _she _was familiar, too. But what of that when it came to the promise of blood…_

* * *

"Ted?"

Her fingers sought his cheek, her thumb hooking his jaw so he was forced to look at her.

"It wasn't your fault."

"I could have killed you." He said, so quietly she had to strain to hear him. "I nearly did."

"I was an idiot for even being there."

"If I hadn't –"

* * *

_The wolf was ready to strike when something in his brain rebelled. It shook its head to rid itself of the annoyance, but instead it grew. It kicked and screamed its way to the front, becoming stronger each moment, driven by one thought: 'I AM ME!' The thought shouldered into the wolf like a battering ram, forcing it aside._

'I AM ME!'

* * *

"But you did!" Lilly grasped his head in both hands, eyes boring into his. "That's what counts!"

Ted nodded slightly, eyes falling shut.

* * *

_The girl was white as a ghost, shivering uncontrollably, but she was otherwise unharmed. He actually _felt_ his eyes change colour, the pupils like saucers contracting to fit his usual storm-grey irises. Lilly cried out. It was hard to say whether it was in relief or terror, but to his acute hearing it was the worst sound in all the world. He backed off, the wolf clawing furiously at his mind. For the moment, however, he was as immovable as the mountains. He watched intently as she got up._

"_Oh, Ted."_

_Her voice shook so badly the words barely made it out of her mouth. The werewolf cowered back, whimpering pitifully. It was only when she started forward that he came to his senses. Suddenly furious, he let out an ear-splitting howl, baring his long fangs at the maverick fifteen-year-old. She didn't need telling twice. Turning on her heel, she bolted from the clearing with the speed of a gazelle, leaving him alone with the moon._

_Only once she was gone did he feel the wall crumble._

* * *

"I'm fine!" She insisted. "And via any more of that stuff you were knocking back last night, so are you!"

"Lilly, the potions were the only reason I was able to stop myself, don't you see?"

"Bullshit."

"Lilly!"

"No, it is! You don't give yourself enough credit for how much self-control you actually have."

"Then how do you explain this?"

He waved his injured hand angrily about.

"Every relationship has bad patches."

He stared at her in disbelief.

"So you're saying I just need to have a heart to heart with the monster?"

"Well, you could start by not thinking of it as a monster."

"How can you say that – you saw it last night! You saw what I was!"

Ted saw the flash of fear behind the green eyes and it was all he needed. Grabbing her hands, he forced them away so she didn't have to touch him and jammed himself against the headboard. Her face crumpled with hurt confusion as he determinably looked away.

"I am a walking nightmare, Lilly. You're just too stubborn to see otherwise."

He heard her breath catch and didn't need to look to know she was crying. The sound was answered by something breaking inside him over and over again, but he refused to look round. After a while she got up to leave, swallowing back her sobs so that they were nearly silent. Her footsteps drummed in his ears. At the foot of his bed, however, they paused, hesitating for a moment on the hard floor. Her voice was quiet in the still air.

"You're not a monster, Theodor."

She was gone before he could turn back.

* * *

Outside the hospital wing, Lilly sagged against the wall. The energy potion she'd taken was wearing off, revealing the deep weariness beneath. The beginnings of a nasty headache reminded her of how she'd not slept since the night before last, though that wasn't the only reason.

She fumbled for a tissue whilst forcing back the tears. They kept coming anyway, but something in her baulked against succumbing to them. She managed to get a hold of herself with an iron will and marched down to class, grim faced, revealing nothing. Except the puffy eyes. These were hard to conceal, but they paled with the stone look emanating from them. No one dared mention them save James, who got the point of a quill jabbed in his hand for his trouble.

"Ouch! You –"

"That's quite enough!"

The pair jumped. Both cowed in contrition, though privately Lilly marvelled at Professor Binns even noticing. He forgot them almost immediately and continued his droning about the goblin riots. James shot her a glare, rubbing his hand, but said nothing more. They spent the rest of the lesson in simmering silence. When it was over, he cornered her outside and demanded what was wrong.

"James, I'm –"

"I'll believe you're fine when I believe Ted!"

"Just fuck off, okay?"

"What the hell's gotten into you lately? You yell at Dom, snap at me and cry whenever Ted talks to you!" For once he looked deadly serious. "You've been cooped up with that record player of yours more times than I can count, and don't tell me it's 'cos you've gotta practice for dancing, 'cos that's bollocks and you know it. What's happening to you?"

The last question was laced with a silent plea that broke into Lilly's façade like a rogue bull.

"I don't know, James!" She roared. "You tell me since you seem to have been paying _so much attention!_ I mean, it can't be because him and dad aren't speaking, can it? Or, or that he just keeps getting further and further away from us?"

She was shaking uncontrollably, tears scorching down her face.

"And so what if Dominic's taken it upon himself to take over – he's not _Ted!_"

"Lilly –"

"He's not Ted! I don't care if he's good to us, _he's not Ted!_"

"Lilly!"

She was about to continue, to try and drive it though her brother's thick skull, when suddenly he threw his arms around her. People stared as he held her tight, crushing the breath from her chest. She choked. The fury ebbed away, leaving only the desolate remnants of her shattered heart. James held onto her as she slowly returned the hug, weeping noisily into his chest as the sobs wracked her body. She heard the motions of someone trying to disperse the crowd, but for once she didn't care she was crying in front of them. They stayed until she sobbed herself into silence before breaking apart.

"Ah, Lil." He murmured, wiping the last drops from her eyes.

"What are we going to do?"

"I don't know. I honestly don't."

"Thank you, James, you're a _great _help."

"Well, what did you expect me to say?"

"I dunno," she shrugged distractedly. "You're always the man with the plan."

"What is it mum always says," he looked aside for a second. "'Life's what happens when you're making plans'?"

Lilly snorted, face breaking into a watery smile.

"What are you trying to say?"

"Err…" he scratched his head. "I'll get back to you on that one."

A laugh finally rippled through her throat, making James smile. Not quite the grin he wore like an advertising icon, but still so like her twin. Sometimes Lilly thought he was useless; wondered how they got through nine months cramped together in the womb without killing each other, but not today. He put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her in so she was forced to stumble.

"That's it!" He said gleefully as she yelped.

"Oh, get off!"

"What've you got now?"

"Have a guess."

He thought for a moment.

"It's divination for you, isn't it?" Now he grinned. "Right, well you have fun with that. I'm just off to do something that's of actual use. See ya!"

Lilly pulled a face.

"It is when you do it properly!"

"If you say so," he shook his head disbelievingly. "Say hi to Professor Lovegood for me, would you?"

"Will do."

She watched him disappear round the corner. He had astronomy – a practical, useful subject in his opinion, and he might have been right. Lilly just didn't have the patience for it: it required spatial memory and a lot of mucking about with calculations, neither of which she enjoyed. Real astronomy also required working a telescope and a bunch of other stuff she didn't have the hands for. It wasn't that she wasn't interested in the skies, just that anything worth knowing she usually asked Ted.

She sighed as she made her way to the tower. Ascending seemed to take an age longer than it normally did with her head spinning in a dozen different directions. She couldn't get past the moment when she was pinned beneath those great, green eyes. Her mind had been all but blank at the time with the knowledge that she was about to die, shredded of all things. Killed by the wolf in the dark.

She passed a window depicting a man hidden in a dark cloak gazing hungrily at a girl in a field of roses. She had a white dress and golden hair. The window didn't show his face.

_But there must be something deeper than that_, she thought, _surely._

There was very little that was truly evil. Voldemort had been evil incarnate, or so everyone said, but even he could be pitied after a fashion. There was nothing _evil_ in nature because it was nature. You couldn't call the dark evil just because it was the dark, that would just be stupid.

The trapdoor interrupted her musings as she passed through it. She was a bit late, but Professor Lovegood never seemed to mind her. She'd probably already been told about Ted being in the hospital, anyway.

"Glad to see you joining us, Miss Potter."

"I'm sorry, professor. Not having the best day."

"Oh, it's quite alright," she said dreamily. "I was just telling the class about the subtleties of reading the weather in small puddles."

Lilly resisted the temptation to quip _"You mean if it's been raining or not?"_ But she had no desire to awake her teacher's ire after being late, so she quickly found her seat. As the woman who was her namesake started up again, she found herself wondering at how batty the Professor came off. She was always on about something, half-aware of the other people in the room, most of whom were staring at her. It was hard to remember sometimes that she had been part of saving the world as they knew it.

Didn't stop her being Loony Luna Lovegood the rest of the time.

With that thought, Lilly tilted her head slowly back, and drifted off.

* * *

_The air was still and cool, a light wind rustling through the trees. It enveloped them in the gentle embrace of the night, the softest moonlight spilling down upon them as they swayed together. Unearthly music fell onto her ears. It was singing and humming through her bones like an ancient lullaby, surrounding and binding them as they turned._

_She sighed contentedly. She felt taller than usual, her legs suspending her high above the forest floor. She looked down to see a silver-white dress rippling smoothly over her skin, perfectly moulded to her body. It was truly magnificent, but it felt perfectly natural. It all did – as though this was where she belonged: a queen of the night forests. Her hair was pinned back atop her head, though she felt strands loose and springing about her face. They strands twirled around her cheeks as she spun, her feet bare upon the soil. A laugh curled itself from her mouth, high and tinkling, in a voice that was hers and not hers._

_Yes, she was the lady of this place; high and lovely and terrible._

_Only when she heard the laughter returned did she look back at her lord. He was clad in simple black, darker than the sky, and laughed with her as he caught her in his arms once more. A part of her surged with joy at the sight of him, whilst another stopped altogether with a feeling of something wrong. Awfully wrong. Her heart and body sank willingly into his strong arms, but something was amiss. The smile was not his. The laugh was foreign. The way he moved with such confidence and grace, something the real Ted could never quite do._

_When they fell into step to turn together, she finally noticed the eyes. Amber-green; fey and beautiful, the pupils so large they threatened to pull her into the abyss. Her own eyes widened and her feet stilled, horror seizing her chest as he pulled her closer._

"_Was this not what you wanted?"_

_Suddenly it was not him but the wolf, its lips pulled back, fangs drawn, eyes glittering with the hunger for blood. She couldn't move, trapped, snared, and she was all alone, no Ted, no one at all. Just her – her and the wolf, so close she could see the saliva on the points of its teeth. She tried to scream, but no noise came out. She was bellowing without a sound, lungs straining as it lowered its muzzle –_

* * *

"Miss Potter?"

Lilly jumped as if she had received an electric shock. It took a moment to realise the whole class was staring at her and that she must have cried out. Professor Lovegood fixed her with a curious look, the utmost attention colouring her eyes.

"Are you quite alright?"

Lilly opened her mouth, but found nothing but vowel sounds coming out of it. She didn't have the breath for anything else. Her professor's concern deepened as she gasped as though she'd run a mile, each breath rattling in her mouth. Her hands shook like leaves in the breeze. She tried to grip the desk for support, but was forced to let go when her fingers refused to obey. Her heart was racing dangerously fast. She slammed a hand over her chest, trying not to hyperventilate as she regained herself. The picture of the wolf plastered over her eyes like some horrific poster, fuelling the fear barrelling through her. Light-headedness descended over her.

_Imfineimfineimfineimfine – _

"Lilly Luna!" Lilly shut her eyes tight as Professor Lovegood grasped her hands urgently. "Speak to me Lilly!"

_I'm fine. I'm fine._

She forced the chant into intervals of deep, regular breaths.

_Okay. Ooookay._

"Mr Davies, would you please take Miss Potter to the hospital wing." A plump boy with mousy hair appeared at her elbow as the teacher eased Lilly out of her seat. Her knees knocked like a first year's on their first encounter with Filch, threatening to unbalance her as they descended the trapdoor. She detested it. She had never imagined herself as fainthearted as this, but at the moment there was nothing she could do. When they reached the ward, she had finally managed to calm down, her heart slowing to normal. She shot a quick glance towards Ted to check whether he was asleep before collapsing into a bed of her own. Sleep took her before the nurse had chance to reach her bed.

* * *

"Hey, Dom."

"You look perkier, at least. How're you feeling?"

"Still groggy." Ted leant back into the pillows before something caught his eye. He raised his head the better to see this strange flash of red – and then went white. He shot up like an adder from a basket, intending to leap out of bed if Dominic hadn't rushed to stop him. It took a strength he didn't know his best friend had to hold him down. Though in his ill state, Ted realised it wasn't surprising. He stared back at him, wild eyed, before Dominic put him at ease.

"No, don't worry! Don't worry! She's fine, absolutely fine! Just…out of it for a bit."

"Why?" Ted stopped struggling to clutch at his friend's arm.

"Madam Pomfrey said what she really needed was about nine hours uninterrupted, dreamless sleep. Not that she needed much help, or so she says, but she gave her a bit of the potion anyway. She's been peaceful for a couple of hours."

"What happened?"

Dominic hesitated slightly.

"Well, apparently she had a minor panic attack in the middle of divination." He said uncertainly. "Lovegood sent her down here before it got any worse."

"Panic attack?"

"Yeah," Dominic shifted uncomfortably. "Do you know what that's about?"

The werewolf shook his head miserably, suddenly drained. The urge to go and find a cliff returned with a vengeance as he lay back, tearing his eyes from the sleeping girl.

_Is there no end to the damage I do to other people?_

"Oi," Dom's voice brought him back to reality. "You still with me?"

"Yes, Dom."

"Good."

They stayed in companionable silence for a few minutes, listening to the gutters drip onto the jutting window ledge. The rain had finally stopped, and Ted almost missed the calming rhythm. He liked the rain. It made all the smells of the earth that much more present.

"You need a girl."

The statement cut through Ted's thoughts like a flying brick.

"_What?_"

"A _girl_," Dominic repeated as if he was talking to a three-year-old. "You know: pretty, sassy, strange physical defects."

"I'm not celibate, Dom, I just don't have a habit of..." He made a rather vague gesture.

"Ted," Dominic's voice was laced with exasperation. "Every species, be they lions, tigers or bears – or wolves – must at some point seek a mate!"

"You've never heard of solitary behaviour patterns?"

"They still have to mate!"

"Really," Ted's voice tinged with anger now. "And have you ever considered that getting that far _might _be an issue for me? That my condition just _might _be a factor in getting close to people?"

He looked away, bristling. His eyes drifted away to Lilly, before he realised and snapped them back.

"How do you know it's a girl?"

"Eh?"

"I mean," he asked bluntly. "Why not a boy?"

Dominic made a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sigh.

"Well, Ted, I'm your best mate and I know about your little fury problem, so I think it's a safe to say I'd know if you were a whoopsie."

Ted had to twitch his lips at that. Irritation ebbing, he turned to his friend to see the weariness cresting the bold features.

"You should get some rest."

"Hey, I'm the one who should be saying that to you!"

"I mean it, Dom!" Ted fixed him a hard look. "You're no good to me if you've gone and collapsed from exhaustion, now get going!"

Dominic looked as though he was about to protest when Ted cut him off.

"I'll be fine, I'm not going anywhere." He gave his friend a weak smile. "You go get yourself a bit of peace for a while."

Reluctantly, Dominic nodded and bade a retreat toward the doors. Just as he was about to leave, he cast a look to where Lilly slept soundly a few beds over. Ted followed his gaze and felt the despair start to grip his heart again, chilling the warmth his best friend had brought him. But, he schooled his face into a smile for Dom, who rolled his eyes as he left, muttering something under his breath. To Ted's acute hearing it sounded something like _'bloody mothering werewolf'_ as the door shut.

The storm eyes fell shut.

* * *

_It must have looked beautiful, peaceful even, but the moonlight burnt his back the same as hot silver. Not once at the moment of change had he felt so exposed. His skin crawled over his muscle as if covered in ants, all scuttling and biting the flesh with searing pincers. The worst was the sensation that he had been flayed open; that his innards were being sucked out into the air. He wanted to move from the light, but his legs wouldn't obey him. They paralysed him there like anchors wedged into the dirt._

* * *

He frowned against his closed lids. On a whim, he gently nudged the instinct he held like a caged beast near his heart. Just something simple – the colour of his eyes, perhaps? He pinched the bridge of his nose in concentration, but almost immediately felt the shape of something sleeping, hidden just beneath his skin. With a shudder of revulsion, he stopped, trembling.

* * *

_It was the oddest sensation: something else opening its eyes in front of his. The feeling of _something else _suddenly appearing to take control of his body; his limbs, his mouth, his heart –_

* * *

He felt the blurry trickling of water from his eyes as he turned to her, making no attempt to staunch it. He fought the images of her lying bloodied and dying at his feet, the life fading from her breath-taking eyes, but they kept coming. They were thick and cloying, clamouring at him until they were all he could see. He imagined her hair, shining now in the sun after the rain, matted and filthy with the dirt and the blood. The feeling of her flesh tearing beneath his claws; between his teeth. The potency of her blood as it hit his system – a thing he had never before _ever _considered. The end; finding her after the night terrors had left, broken, her life taken by the evil that thundered through him…

The thought brought the meagre amount of lunch he'd managed to consume hurtling back up.

He groaned, lurched over the side of the bed and emptied his stomach over the stone.

"Skurgify." He muttered in a voice so cracked, he was grateful he knew how to cast spells without having to utter the incantation. It would have been indecipherable otherwise. Unable to rise from his position hanging over the bed's side, he choked out a sob to the floor. In the wake of everything that had happened, he poured his miseries from him in a small flood. The sob was the only discernible noise he made, though. He shook against the sheets, but he never wailed – though he was close to just screaming outright – and eventually he cried himself out. The cotton sheet was sticky and prickling beneath his cheek, but he barely had the strength to move. With another groan, he inched himself back into a proper lying position and collapsed against the mattress, defeated.

_Why can't I just die? _He thought.

_I'd probably just bugger that up as well._

He let his bundled body fall limp, devoid of any attempt to re-take it. How could Lilly think he was anything other than what he was? The thought snaked into his head that she didn't really believe that. That the shock of the moment had not fully hit her when she had denied it, and she was now _absolutely_ aware that he _was _a monster.

Yet as he thought this, it was as if a bubble of hope he'd been hiding suddenly burst leaving him immeasurably more desolate. As if that was possible.

_But she doesn't say stuff like that unless she's sure and she means it. FUCK!_

He didn't know. He just didn't _know_. The thought of accepting he was a monster terrified him because it meant he had no reason, no purpose. But what right did he have to have hope? After what he nearly did to her?

_FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!_

"You know," a quiet voice started behind him. "You could just talk to me rather than cussing violently in your head."

"Cussing in my head?"

"Yeah," there was a rustling as she got herself into a sitting position. "Whenever you suddenly tense up like that, you're always swearing inside your head."

"You should just say it out loud," she continued off-handedly. "Good for the soul."

"What, to have people think I've got Tourette's? They already think I'm unbalanced."

"Na, if you start swearing more they'll just think you're normal."

"And only we'll know the truth?" He said weakly. "What happened?"

"I fell asleep and had a bit of a nightmare, that's all."

"Need I ask what it was about?"

"Look, I still don't think you're a monster, Ted. But that doesn't mean having the wolf nearly rip me apart wasn't scary as hell."

The words hit him like the point of a pike.

"I _was_ the wolf!"

"Really," she said curiously. "I thought it was just something you turned into. Like a separate person."

"Yeah, well, kind of, but –"

"But what? You're not making any sense Theodor!"

"You think it makes sense to _me_?" He cried hopelessly. "It is and it isn't separate. And I feel _everything_ it feels; every thought, every sense, every whim –"

He stopped suddenly, strangled by the way his throat tightened. He saw her again on the forest floor, blood strewn through her hair, and felt his eyes burn. It was never going to stop, never, as long as he went on. He would keep hurting her over and over until she was forced to hurt him back, and that would break him to pieces. He would be shunted aside, as he was in the forest, and then that _thing_ would come out, baying for blood…

He vaguely heard the sounds of the girl slipping out of bed and padding silently to his side. Instinctively, he shied away, trying as hard as he could not to touch her, not to sully her with his stained hands. He jumped back against the wall, eyes racing to hers like a cornered beast. But there was no malice in those bottle-green orbs – he doubted there ever could be. Instead he found himself drawn by the quiet calm they held; that secret confidence that showed only occasionally. At their pain, though, he felt as if he was drowning in them, helpless as a new-born lamb. He wanted to run away and never ever have to make her suffer him again. He shut his eyes.

* * *

_The instant he ripped back control from the beast, he stared down at the girl, still on her back against the dirt. There was a whole moment as the last of the wolf left him. A moment when he shared its thoughts; its hunger, its addiction, its awe – but _it _didn't consider her death. He did._

* * *

He wanted to die.

Then, something happened that he was entirely unprepared for. In one move, Lilly launched herself onto the mattress and wrapped her arms tightly around him, chin jutting over his shoulder like a hook. For a split second, horror coursed through him and he tried to throw her off, mind a blur. But it was like trying to dislodge a limpet, and she refused to budge.

"Lilly," he whispered brokenly.

"Shut up. Just, shut up, okay?"

Shaking with sobs that wrenched themselves up his throat, he slowly raised his arms to her back, falling into her embrace. Suddenly, it was as if a dam burst and he was hugging her more tightly than he had ever done. He was clutching her to him like he never wanted to let go, all his longing poured through him like the water leaking from his eyes. It didn't matter anymore that she was fifteen and _Lilly – your sister, for fuck's sake! – _she was _there_. She was there like the last piece of sanity in an insane universe and he clung on for dear life.

"Ted?"

The question edged him back to reality. He let out a questioning "hmm", muffled against her shoulder.

"You feeling better?"

"Little bit. Maybe."

He tried to make himself ease his grip, but somehow he couldn't win the war with his limbs.

"I miss you." She said suddenly.

"Miss me?" He pulled back just enough to turn to her, heart clenching in surprise.

"You're all…drifting away from us. You're a good man, Ted. I don't wanna lose you, not to this."

Her eyes were glittering like stars. Ted let his head fall back to her shoulder, burying his nose in her shirt. It was already soaked through. He was bearing his most vulnerable self to her, but he didn't mind in the end. She had already seen him at his worst.

* * *

_He shuddered in the bluish glow of the dawn. He was trapped against the ground, unable to do more than crawl through the leaf litter. His head felt like it was going to split open – or pull him into a dimension made of oil and water. Everything kaleidoscoped around him in a whirl of trees and blurred shapes. The dirt beneath him pitched like the sea, forcing him to cling to it absurdly lest he be thrown from it. After a while, it softened to a gentle rocking, and he was able to look to the birds singing high above him._

_Pain stabbed inside his skull, and he shut his eyes hard. Every one of his limbs ached, but it was a different feeling than normal. Instead of burning, they were icy and stiff. He felt as if all his blood had fled into the dying night with the wolf-skin. Giving up attempts to move, he lay shivering beneath the brightening sky, reality falling from him in lumpy fragments. When the darkness neared completion, he greeted it with relief._

_Then something fluttered over his shoulders, and he frowned in confusion. He felt himself being wrapped in something thick and soft and slowly rolled over to face the one that had found him._

_A mass of damp, tangled red hair tickled his face as she leant over him._

"_Ted? Talk to me, please!"_

"_Lil?" It was barely more than a croak._

"_Oh, thank god!" She rushed away, but was back almost immediately with a one of the bottles from his bag. With trembling hands, she held the lip to his mouth and helped him down the pepper up potion. It seared his throat, making him cough, but immediately he felt the darkness recede. He heard the dull thump of glass hitting the soil as she tossed it aside and fell to her knees beside him._

"_You look like death."_

_He couldn't think of anything to say to that. He felt like death. He felt he should say something about what happened, but everything was so blurry and muddled he could barely remember what _did_ happen. Instead, he let his eyes take in her appearance. Had she been out all night?_

"_Come on." She muttered._

* * *

"You're not a monster, Ted. What you become isn't a monster, and even if you think it is, that bit isn't you. You're _good_. Don't forget that."

Ted nodded numbly. He didn't know whether he believed her or not, but her words at least made him feel a little better. A wave of exhaustion washed through him and his grip faltered. Lilly's arms gently released him so he could slide back onto the bed, eyes growing heavy.

"Have good dreams, Ted."

He felt Lilly lay her head against his chest, breathing evenly over his heart. Peace enveloped him like a warm bath for the first time in months as he drifted to sleep.

* * *

Quite a while later, when Dominic walked in to check on them, he found them still there, fast asleep as bats in winter. His mouth twitched as he saw Lilly, snoozing contentedly with Ted as a pillow. He sighed, almost laughing out loud at the pair of them. As if he didn't _know _what was really bothering Ted; the doe-eyed looks he gave her when he thought no one was looking. Rolling his eyes, he quietly tip-toed over to Lilly's unoccupied bed and retrieved the blanket to throw over them.

They were almost nauseatingly sweet together. He had to stuff his cuff into his mouth to stifle a giggle as he accidentally dislodged one of Lilly's arms. The result was Ted mumbling something in his sleep and unconsciously pulling her closer. He would no doubt come to his inane senses tomorrow – or whenever he woke up to find Lilly in his arms. He would panic and make a prat of himself, sprouting every reason he had concocted to push her away. It seemed ridiculous, the way they were now, completely safe with no one but each other.

Frowning slightly, he shifted his gaze to Lilly. For all her sass, she was so innocent of the ways of the heart. He supposed he shouldn't be surprised. She was only a kid, after all, even if she was _so _far from innocent in other ways.

With a last smile, he turned and left them to their dreams.

Lilly twitched a little beneath the blanket. She was dancing again.

* * *

_**A.N: Ahha, isn't a bit of catharsis good? Well on the way to running up the real adventure, don't worry. Review? Oh, and 'surrounds us and binds us' I nicked unashamedly off Star Wars, just cos it fit so well. Danse Macabre is 'the dance of death', originally a painting I think. It's also been a song several times and in opera.**_


	4. Rambling Through The Avenues Of Time

**Chapter Three**

_**Rambling Through the Avenues of Time**_

Dominic's prediction of Ted 'coming to his senses' rang true later that night. With the serene pull of sleep heavy in his head, he languidly stretched his knees, feeling better than he had in weeks. The feeling made him want to stay in bed and never have to get up again. So he lay there peaceably with his eyes shut, wondering a little at what was pinning down his limbs. Whatever it was felt heavy, but for some reason he didn't mind the weight. It was warm and comforting. With a small smile, he pulled it closer to him.

It shifted in his arms.

He frowned. Pillows, even heavy ones, didn't habitually _wriggle_ when touched. Not ones James hadn't had a hold of, anyway. He slowly opened his eyes and scrunched his neck to have a look down. His eyes were met with a mass of red hair.

_Oh holy mother fu –_

He was in bed. With Lilly. With Lilly lying, cool as you please, right on top of his chest. Swallowing his cry of horrified shock, he gently pushed her off his side, sliding away from her as he did. She mumbled something in protest, but didn't wake. Trying his best not to panic, Ted continued the process before edging away as far as possible.

_What the hell is wrong with you?_

He jerked the blanket off his torso so it could completely cover her, and then edged away more. A small part of him couldn't shake the wild, intoxicating feeling of her weight against his heart; her warmth like a lamp in the dark. A much, much larger part, however, had started screaming a non-stop barrage of '_she's your blood sister, she's your blood sister, you utter bastard!_' What on _earth_ had he been thinking? She had stopped him falling, but that certainly didn't bloody well mean he could start thinking of her like –

"Aarg!"

He cried out suddenly as he tumbled off the bed. Lilly groaned in surprise at the sound of him thumping onto the floor.

"Whashappening," she mumbled. "Ted?"

Limbs whirled round as he tried to disentangle them. He attempted to leap to his feet, but the movement still made him dizzy and he fell back with an inelegant crash.

"What _are _you doing?"

"Nothing." He gasped, wincing in pain. "You just go back to sleep."

"What time is it?"

"Don't know."

He glanced about to where her original bed was and half scrambled, half crawled over, clambering clumsily onto the frame.

"You still a bit woozy, then?"

"Ah," he hissed slightly as he sunk into the empty bed. "Little bit, yeah."

"Fever's gone down, though. You don't look so much like a vampire anymore."

He looked up.

"I suppose that's a relief."

"Yeah," she yawned. "Wouldn't want people to get mixed up."

Ted grinned into the sheets, loosing a chuckle through the cotton.

"Now that _would _be ironic."

There was a pause. He thought she'd fallen asleep again, but then her voice floated dreamily across the space between.

"Ted?"

"Hmm?"

"Ted?"

"What?"

"You gonna be okay now?"

He thought about it for a long moment, letting his mind run over the despair that had so clutched him. It was still there, but it had been chased back to the darkest corners of his mind, gone for the time being. It had been replaced by something lighter that made him feel…better; not quite so poorly disposed. Made him feel real and _solid_. He was Ted; not the _thing_ that slept beneath his skin, or the mind that had taken over. Just Ted. He might feel guilty and angry and confused by the feelings that had put it there, but it was there nonetheless.

Hope.

"Ted?"

He raised his head and nodded, hauling himself up the bed so he could lie down properly.

"I could do with a bit of time to sort things out."

"Well, you have the time." She said, almost reproachfully. He glanced at her before realising what she meant.

"Ah, Lilly. I'm sorry I've been so…" he tried to think of the word. "…useless lately."

"There's no need to apologise." She sighed. "Just, you know…"

"I'll make it up to you."

"Yeah."

She thought for a moment.

"How about a ride on the _Helios 3_?"

"Absolutely not."

"Oh, come on!" Lilly pouted in exasperation. "We've barely seen her!"

"Your mum would kill me if she found out! Plus you don't know how to drive!"

"How different is it from riding a bike?"

"It's a bike that clocks at one hundred and fifty miles an hour." He said dryly. "And that's how fast I knowit goes. I designed it to do more."

"And?"

Ted sighed exasperatedly, hiding the way his lips tugged at the corners by burying his head in the sheets.

"Look, I haven't tuned it properly, and after what happened with the _Helios 2_ I'd rather reserve judgement, alright?"

Lilly rolled her eyes.

"Fine," she gave an exaggerated sigh. "But you'd better think of something."

"Don't worry," he said softly. "I will."

He paused to let the gloom of the hospital wing lure him into a stupor. After a few minutes he felt the pull of sleep once more, his exhausted, emotion ravaged mind slipping slowly and gently into the blissful quiet. Rolling onto his back, he stared for a moment at the ceiling, pushing back the memory of Lilly lying beside him. It was just insane to even contemplate, even if parts of him didn't quite agree. Despite how much it hurt, though, he would get through it. For her.

He allowed his eyes to drop back to her blanketed form, stretched and curled like a cat on his former bed. _For her. _He smiled.

"Good night, Lilly."

"Night, Ted."

* * *

The next day was grey, but bright. The sky resembled a dove's wing, all white and feathery with the sun behind giving the whole thing a stark glow. Ted wanted to leave the hospital immediately, but Madam Pomfery stubbornly refused to let him go. He protested, but she insisted he needed a couple more hours. In the end, he didn't manage to escape until after lunch.

Lilly had gone before he woke up.

He didn't know how he felt about that. Had she realised they'd fallen asleep in the same bed? It would have been hard not to notice. Worse was the thought that she'd read what he'd meant in his hug; read in it his guilty feelings for her. He wouldn't know until he saw her next, though, and he prayed to the gods that she thought it was all normal. He would have given _anything_ for her not to have noticed.

The thought that his slip might have caused her to realise was mortifying. It shattered whatever semblance of calm he might have had the night before like a hammer to a mirror. Did she know? What did she think? _Could she ever…?_

He quickly cut that last train of thought – of course she could never return the way he felt! She'd probably call him a perverted fucking idiot and revile him for even considering the idea. In his isolation, he tried to force himself to calm down; to stop thinking and focus on being well again.

Unfortunately, apart from kicking about restlessly, thinking was all he could do. Through the morning his mind spun, finally working him into agitation by the time he got out. When he did, he resisted the urge to run around every corridor in the castle to find her and explain. That would have been ludicrous, even for him. He opted instead for a casual state of nonchalance and went about his day, eyes skinned raw for a flash of wildfire hair. Every time he thought he saw her, his heart drummed like a rabbit's. It settled back in disappointment with each, but either way it was ridiculous.

_I'm not attracted to Lilly, I'm not attracted to Lilly…_

The mantra didn't help. He desperately needed something to distract him from the buzzing sensation she'd left implanted in his chest. The good thing was, his classes did just that. They were pushing harder than ever now the exams were getting nearer, and missing a day hadn't helped.

He was still unsteady on his feet in defence against the dark arts as they did a practical with fire shields. The entire unit was about manipulating elemental forces, and it transpired he needed all his wits about him so as not to get incinerated. It was perhaps lucky he was a natural and nurtured prodigy at the subject: he was talented and quick witted, his reactions as a werewolf naturally fast. In the end, he managed to barrel through the exercise without injury.

In potions, he wasn't so fortunate.

The class had studied the recipe the lesson before, and now it was time to put it to practice. It was one of the subjects he considered his very best, but it was also the most difficult. Especially, he quickly realised, when he couldn't quite focus absolutely on what he was doing. The fug in the dungeons exacerbated his constant state of underlying dizziness to the point where the image blurred badly. He tried to shake off the mist, succeeding in making his headache worse. It spiked through his skull. Ted belligerently ploughed on, but he knew he was struggling. It was a recipe that took finesse and delicacy coupled with the most precise calculations. Even without preparation for the technique, it was almost impossible with the way the room kept pitching. The only reason he got as far as he did was because he was so good with his hands.

Still, he should have been amazed he lasted so long.

He was in the middle of slicing the roots of several different boiled herbs, the blade flashing in his hand. It blurred with the sheer speed of his movements, until a wave of blackness hit him like a blow to the back. His hands spasmed, his right forcing the knife deep into the side of his left. He cried out in pain and surprise, letting go of it altogether. It crashed over the bench.

"What is it?" Professor Slughorn sidled over to his star student with concern.

"You cut yourself, young Lupin? Say," he continued on reaching him. "You don't look too well."

"I'm sorry, professor." He cradled his left hand before leaving it to run the right through his hair. "I feel a bit…light-headed."

"Oh dear, do you need to step outside for a bit?"

Corona ringed black spots flashing in his eyes as he nodded grimly. The old man led him into the storeroom with a sad smile, shutting the door to give them a bit of privacy. Wordlessly, he patched the hand with a bandage and a potion that stung as it made contact with his skin.

"Essence of dittany with a lacing of…acidic nightshade. To fight infection." He observed. "Achievable together only when mixed at extremely high temperature, combined with a catalyst to preserve both primary ingredients. Mandrake extract most probably. But only at less than five per cent concentration so to reduce the risk of the mandrake properties interfering with the effects."

"Very good, my boy!"

He shrugged.

"I mix it regularly."

"Ah, well I suppose you would." His professor frowned as he finished up. "All those cuts and scratches."

Unconsciously, Ted pulled his healing palm away from Slughorn. The man squinted at him critically.

"You look a bit pale." He tutted. "Don't suppose it has anything to do with the other night, does it?"

"Perhaps," Ted shifted uncomfortably. "I'm fine, professor, really. I just need a few minutes."

"Oh," Slughorn seemed a little taken aback. "Well, feel free to return once you're feeling better."

"Thank you, professor."

The old man left, wheezing slightly as he went. Ted lent against one of the few spaces of free wall and let his eyes spill over the shelves. They were crammed with jars and bottles of every size, each carefully labelled with a swatch of yellowish parchment. The larger items occupied the higher tiers. These ranged from horns, skins and sabre-like teeth to what Ted recognised as a genuine dragon scale, tucked away at the back. There were also cabinets, intricately carved and very old – if the designs were anything to go by. They were well worn, each bearing the individual marks of different spills, overlapping like paint.

Ted reckoned one could navigate the storeroom simply by knowing the unique pattern of each cabinet. The one in the corner with the scorch marks – presumably the result of a minor explosion – contained all the various powders. Across from him stored dried seeds, and behind a pillar on his left was the largest one that held the stones. Even Ted, who had seen many things in his short life, had been boggled by the sheer number of different properties a simple rock could have. Of course, there were the bezors and moonstones and a few other well-known ones. Coupled with these, though, were items as mundane as slate which, if used properly, blocked the most powerful curses.

Apparently, powdered pearls made for a potent euphoriant if mixed with belladonna and rosewater. It wasn't something Ted had ever tested, however, and he didn't intend to start now.

When his vision eventually cleared, he cracked his neck and swept back inside.

He couldn't resist swiping a sprig of dried mistletoe from the bunches near the ceiling, though. Soaked in moondew, even a little gave the consumer a looser tongue than Hagrid after a night at the Three Broomsticks. Certainly, they could find uses for that for that. As a start.

* * *

"Ted?"

The confused call behind him came just as Ted finished the wrappings.

"Er…mate? What're you doing?"

"Fixing up my deign notes."

"Why?"

"For Lilly." He ignored Dominic's exasperated look. "She asked about the bike, so I thought…"

"You didn't have to go and get wrapping paper like it's her birthday!"

"Yeah, I know, but –"

"And what's that?"

He'd noticed the mistletoe on the table next to the rough package.

"You know, most people think of a rose. Or I suppose in her case it'd be a lily!"

"What _are _you talking about?"

"Flowers?"

Ted's gaze snapped to the dried branch before spinning back to glare at Dominic.

"Something for her to use in the interests of mischief!"

"Oh, yeah?" his friend gave a coy smirk.

"Look, I'm just trying to do something nice for her to make up for being such a self-absorbed twat, okay?" Ted's fingers whirled around the knot. "I'm gonna think of something for Albus and James as well, but just bear with me!"

The two things disappeared into his bag and he made to storm off.

"Okay, okay, sorry!" Dominic held up his hands in defeat. "Sometimes mistletoe is just mistletoe, I get it."

"Right."

"You think Albus might like us hexing Doreen Finch?"

"Probably," Ted sighed. "Not that Lilly and James haven't already taken care of it, I suspect. Besides, she's a second year and we're supposed to be responsible."

"You could, I dunno, mix something special up for James. You know, a clever little chemical he hasn't seen before?"

"I make stuff for him all the time, there's very little he hasn't seen."

"I thought you were meant to be the genius!" Dominic chided him in mock horror. Then he grinned and clapped him on the back.

"You'll think of something."

Ted returned the smile as he walked out of the common room to go to charms.

* * *

The lesson was gruelling. They were practicing the tricky art of imbuing photographic developing fluid; the very secrets by which magical pictures moved. For Ted though, the process was nightmarish as he tried to weave the spell around the potions' own properties. He understood that part probably better than anyone else, but ironically enough it was distracting. He had never been as good with abstract spell casting as he was with physically manipulating something, and it showed.

After a valiant attempt, he gave up.

His thoughts drifted to how to find Lilly. He wondered if she had been avoiding him. It was certainly possible. He ran a hand through his hair and winced when the newest cut throbbed. Flitwick gave him a pitying look as he examined his work.

"Not quite on form today, are we Mr Lupin." He quipped in his squeaky voice. Ted sighed.

"You could say that."

His professor shook his head, but made no further comment as he moved on. Ted wondered why he often found spells like that troublesome. In defence it was the same as he often took best to the spells that were simple and decisive. When using the fire shield, he revelled in its simplicity and the physicality in the corresponding the wand movements. Each shifted it with the precision of a marionette's strings; there was nothing intrinsically fiddly about casting it. Not after one mastered exactly how sensitive the movements had to be, anyway.

It was just the way his brain worked, he supposed. Some were born to do charms on a door, whilst others were born to go '_sod it_' and just split it with an air cannon. Or use picks to get at the lock. Yes, in fact, that sounded more like him. The incurable _engineer_. Doomed to pity the rest of the wizarding world for their rejection of technology as important.

It was laughable that most of wizarding technology was bastardised from muggle machines: radios, the lifts at the ministry, clocks and watches. Even cars when they needed them, but they were all just enchanted versions of the muggle counterparts. There was no progress of their own! Not in centuries, though most wizards used technology of one sort or another every day. Apparently, Dumbledore himself had revived the art of inventing in his own inimitable way, but it had never caught on.

At least he had potions. And…the other thing. The thing that he'd spent the last six months trying to perfect. The thing that related intimately back to the scholarship he was trying to get with the ministry, provided his NEWTS backed him up. It was one reserved for the boffins of Hogwarts' seventh years where each student had to produce something remarkable in an area of ministry interest. For some, it was conservation – his friend Amanda Skye frequented the forest with her notebook on the status of the unicorn population. She studied them in great detail and planned to present a possible programme for re-introduction in the remote areas of Britain.

Another of the applicants was focussing on ethics and the various treatments of both wizards and magical creatures under the current law. As for Ted, he had found every string he could pull to get access to the info on time turners.

And built one.

* * *

"_You've gone mental! The ministry lost half the secrets to time turners when mum and dad sacked the department of mysteries years ago! How exactly are you going to _build_ one?"_

"_Well, someone had to have done it originally, James."_

"_But you don't even know if it's going to work!"_

"_He's right, Ted. You could be throwing away this whole thing if it turns out to be a wild goose chase."_

"_Yeah, but Lilly I _want _to do something _special_. Something that's a challenge while at the same time being something I'm good at."_

"_You think you're good enough to pull this off?"_

"_Maybe."_

"_It's a lot riding on 'maybe'."_

"_I know." He looked sadly at the pitiful amount of research he'd managed to coax up. "But…you know I've always wanted to try this."_

"_Still think you're mental."_

"_Yes, well, name me a famous inventor who wasn't."_

"_You're really going for 'inventor' now?"_

"_I made you the turntable, didn't I?"_

* * *

He smiled, though his heart flipped in worry. It was nearly ready – _I think_, he added, _I hope. _Lilly had been right, it was a hell of a gamble, and one that wouldn't necessarily pay off. Her pale face sprang back into his mind like a kitten hidden in curtains for someone to walk past. Yanking his thoughts back to the task at hand, he suddenly had an idea.

Lilly sighed. She felt as if her head had been turned inside out and then fired in a kiln. It had been odd, falling asleep with her arms around Ted – not that she hadn't thought about it before hand. In fact, she had just recently started to imagine many situations in which it might happen, but to actually do it was weird. That was life for you. She had managed to look him in the face after seeing him starkers, though; a victory for propriety if ever there was one. But she was scared that might have just been the aftermath of what happened. When she saw him again…

On the other hand, she was insanely overjoyed at having him back. The feeling of safety and strength like sitting in front of a warm fire at Christmas was overwhelming, fuelling the grin that refused to go away. She practically skipped around the corridors to her classes, the clouds following her suddenly bursting with sunshine. Everyone noticed it, including James. He immediately asked her how she'd done it, and Lilly had had to fight down a violent blush.

"Seriously, what happened?"

"Just…fixed things. Kind of. And other stuff."

She wished she could be more eloquent under pressure. James just gave her a strange look before sauntering off, the relax of his shoulders telling her he was as relieved as she was. Albus was harder to avoid, though, and she suddenly found herself in the rather embarrassing position of being interrogated by an eleven-year-old.

"You must have done something special, cos he's looking loads better as well."

"Well, I sort of, um, reassured him."

"What d'you mean?"

"Well he was all depressed, wasn't he?" She raised her eyebrows witheringly.

"So, you just…talked to him?"

"Yeah," and then at Albus' sceptical look added. "It was a good talk."

"Must have been."

She had snuck off after that, not really wanting to tell her brothers what had happened. It wasn't as though they'd even tried anything. He'd just been upset and in need of a friend, but she doubted if most people would see it that way. Particularly James.

She found it hard to feel guilty though, because in the end it was about her being there for him. And she didn't regret that. More selfishly, she didn't regret bringing him back either, and so the feeling of being complete lingered on into the afternoon. She found herself in a corridor after her last lesson – an hour of transfiguring mice to have various iridescent fur colours – swaying a dance. It was a little waltz she stepped, turning as though with another and twirling on her feet.

She passed a series of large boards nailed high on the wall, listing students that had gained some honour in their time at Hogwarts. Smiling, not missing a step, she ambled down the line until she saw one stained slightly with age. She was near the trophy room, she realised. On the board she recognised the names of her parents, her uncles, her aunt Hermione and a dozen others that had fought in the battle for Hogwarts. For those that had given their lives, there was a huge silver shield in the room beyond. Their first year, Ted had dragged her and James inside to see it, pointing out their Uncle Fred's name. There were his parents' names on there as well.

Suddenly she thought of a tune, and hummed it quietly to herself.

"_I was wondering through the streets of the city, rambling through the avenues of time…_"

Her voice lilted softly on the warm air.

"_When from nowhere my eyes fell onto a girl, and by chance her eyes fell onto mine…_"

She waltzed away, the song on her lips, swaying and turning in the afternoon's glow. She sung the first vocals in gentle tones, giggling a bit at the lines she missed. By the time she came to the entrance hall doors there were more than a couple of people listening, but she barely noticed.

"_There's a girl I described she's as real as the wind, it's true I saw her today…_"

Her heart hummed as she stepped into the breeze.

"_The other details are inventions, _

"_Because I prefer her that way._"

* * *

"Lil?"

The sun was just about to set as Ted tentatively opened the door to the room of requirement. The vaulted ceiling flew over a vast space beneath, completely open and with a spring floor like a stage. All around the walls hung banners and drapes in gossamer and silk; reds and golds and oranges. They fluttered with the draft as if the walls were made from flame. The room itself was completely bare of anything save a small table off to the side of the centre. On it was the record player, crackling slightly as the vinyl spun round. As he stepped in, it was playing Tchaikovsky's _Piano Concerto _in sequence, and she was dancing.

Somehow, he knew he would never tire of seeing her move like that: she was a true artist. The way she leapt and spun and dived with the grace of a cat was astonishing. Yet even with feet light as feathers, there was strength in her movements. Like a knife slicing through the air.

He smiled to himself. Not many realised it, but unlike most dancers who were knocked over by a light breeze, Lilly packed a wallop. She was a lot stronger than she looked, though she thoroughly enjoyed the assumption she was innocent. It made it easier for her and James to reap total havoc.

"Ted!"

"Oh," he felt a little embarrassed at intruding. "You didn't have to stop, just cos –"

"Oh, no, it's fine! I was about go and get changed for dinner anyway."

She reached up to release her hair from the pin that held it tightly back. It tumbled haphazardly over her shoulders, slightly lank. Her face was flushed pink with the exertion as she made her way to the record player, pulling her clothes on over her leotard.

"Were you looking for me?"

"Hmm? Oh, yeah!"

Ted had to kick his brain to get it working properly again. How hard was it to just _act normal_?

"Actually," he pulled off his bag to rummage through it. "Since you mentioned about me doing something for you, I thought I'd get you…this. To say sorry. For being useless."

He held out the parcel. Lilly's eyebrows shot upwards.

"Ted…you didn't have to do all this…" She said softly. Ted smiled.

"Why not?"

"Well," she seemed to be trying to grasp a reason. "Well…thanks then!"

Ted's heart fluttered as her face split into a grin.

"You're most welcome. And…" he returned the grin conspiratorially, suddenly emboldened.

"There's more?"

"I'm not gonna show you the bike." Her face fell a little at this, but he continued. "But there was another trinket you were asking after, if I recall. Something a bit smaller…"

Lilly's eyes widened.

"It's nearly finished?" She asked excitedly. Ted's smile wavered a bit.

"Well, kind of. Mostly."

He reached into his pocket and pulled it out. It hung on a chain, but instead of being shaped like an hourglass, he had designed it like an old-fashioned pocket watch. The pattern of cogs and gears etched onto the silver-gold surface shifted under the light as he held it out.

"It's beautiful, Ted."

"Thanks."

His eyes prickled with pride as she took the time turner and examined it closely. It was heavier than it looked, though this was because he had enlisted Arthur Weasley's help to expand the gear compartments. He hoped she wouldn't open it. Inside was a jumbled forest of clockwork he'd patched together like pieces of a dozen different jigsaws. And, there was the scorch mark on the hinge he'd only just managed to scrub out. After that, Ted's mind wouldn't stay quiet, running over all the imperfections. There was the loose wiring, the sticky gear, the oil that needed changing, the stuck spring, not to mention the front fell off when you opened it up. Oh, and, just apart from all this, he wasn't even remotely sure whether any of it _actually_ worked.

If everything he'd thought of was correct, then it shouldwork. _Should_. Maybe.

"How's it work then?"

"Err…I haven't worked out a proper interface yet." Another thing to chalk down. "But I suppose, it's a bit like a microscope. You see the plate on the front – the bit you've got your thumb on – that rotates for rough refinement of the temporal fields."

_I think._

"And then the dial at the top that spins beneath where you click it: that does narrow refinement."

_Probably. Could turn the lights on and off for all I know, but I'm being optimistic._

"Why did you build it with two dials? I mean, didn't the old time turners just have one bit that you turned?"

"Yeah, but it turns out its better if it's split. One dial stabilises the other when the power at the heart kicks in."

"The heart?"

"Just…" he pointed vaguely at the middle of the casing. "What I call it. It's sort of a bunch of potions and dust that spins around inside, shifting time it as it goes."

"And the dials...they…"

"Modify the output. Controlling the direction and when to cut the power."

"Cut the power?"

"Well it's got to stop at some point, otherwise you'd be stuck floating through time forever."

"Imagine that." She murmured dreamily. Ted shuddered. That idea had been mostly what had stopped him directly testing the thing for about a month. The thought of being just _disconnected _from the whole of time, unable to land anywhere until your body gave out, was terrifying.

"And the clicker at the top?"

"That powers up the heart. The latches at the side open up the casing, though."

"I see."

He watched in alarm as her thumb ghosted over the top.

"Hey, careful!" He snatched it back hurriedly. "If there's one thing I don't want, it's having to explain to your mother how you ended up in the middle ages."

"The middle ages? I thought time turners only had a limited range?"

"Classically, yes," he ran a free hand through his hair so it stood on end. "But, I mean, it's not as though I've been completely accurate to the old ones."

"So that could go back…_years? _Decades?"

"I don't know!" He shrugged agitatedly. "Or it might not work at all. I just don't think mucking about with it is such a good idea."

Without giving her a chance to respond, he stowed it safely back in his robes.

"So," he forced up a smile. "What do you think?"

"Great."

She gave a hearty laugh before throwing her arms around him again. Taken aback, Ted hesitantly returned the hug, grateful she broke away a moment later. The feelings he'd been repressing all day rocketed to the surface.

_No, not, not even slightly, not a chance, absolutely, _no.

"Oh, I'm so proud of you!"

Slumping in embarrassment, he shrugged whilst trying to fight a smile.

"Shut up."

"Disarmed by a fourth year? You ought to be ashamed Ted!"

They both looked around in surprise.

"Hello, Dom."

"You shown her the flowers yet?"

"Mistletoe." He said quickly as Lilly opened her mouth. "For causing mayhem."

"Oh, thanks Ted!"

She went to sorting the turntable, returning the record to its paper sleeve.

"Thought I might find you two here. What's he been doing, Lil? Nothing nefarious, I hope?"

Ted frowned at the disquietingly knowing look he was giving both of them, but Lilly just shrugged, her grin wicked.

"He's been showing me his super-secret government project!" She giggled.

"Oh, god." Dominic muttered, just loud enough for Ted to hear him. "I suppose he'll have to kill you now, then. Eh?"

Ted gave him a withering look as Dom nudged him in the ribs. Unfortunately, this meant he missed the devilish spark that crossed Lilly's face as she straightened up. When he looked, she'd schooled her face into a mask of perfect innocence – enough to make him want to run a mile.

"What?" He asked warily. She flashed him a bright, pretty smile.

"Well, I've been lacking a partner all day, and we've still got a bit of time before dinner."

"A bit of time for what?"

Without answering, she bent down to the box next to the table, picking out a sliver of cardboard printed with '_Glen Miller_'. Unease settled at the pit of his stomach as she extracted the vinyl and carefully placed it in the depression. Her wand flicked elegantly to position the needle, before flicking the switch.

And, of course it had to be _Moonlight Serenade_.

"Lilly, what –"

"I need to practice this," she took up position in front of him, one hand on his shoulder. "So don't be such a stiff, come on."

He heard the snicker behind him and imagined Dominic, barely able to control his fit of laughing. Lilly was perfectly straight faced though, so he reluctantly took her other hand and put his own on her waist. He felt as if his brain had just been freeze-dried, stumbling over his feet as she pulled them onto the floor proper. Dominic wolf-whistled as they turned. Ted glared. He was breathing heavily, having constantly to look down at his feet.

That was him: wonderful hands, terrible co-ordination with his feet.

_Well, considering where my hands are now…Oi!_

He shut his eyes, making Lilly laugh suddenly, switching so she could lead. After that, it went rather much better and they fell into something like rhythm. After everything that had happened over the last few days, it was surprisingly soothing in a way nothing else was. They moved, and they turned. And then they swayed to the side, and turned again.

Suddenly they were apart again, and he was sighing in disappointment.

"That wasn't so bad." She said quietly.

He raised an eyebrow at her, causing her to giggle again. Still grinning madly, she skipped past him to get box and the player, leaving him still swaying a bit in the middle of the floor.

"You alright, mate?"

"I'm fine." He believed it this time. "Still just tired."

He raised a hand to his pocket, hoping to feel the comforting weight of the time turner against his side.

It wasn't there.

Lilly waited all of thirty seconds before the storm hit. She fumbled with the record to get it back in the box, fighting the urge to laugh like a maniac. The watch-shaped device knocked against her thigh in her skirt pocket; the best idea for getting back at him she'd had all year. Suddenly she heard the cry of shock behind her and stepped gracefully to the door.

"You little minx!"

_Now_ she was laughing, darting like an arrow out of the door and along the corridor beyond. Her heart felt like it was in the clouds as she bounded down the stairs, leaping down like a cat. The thudding of Ted hot on her tail only exacerbated the feeling as she wove through people, swift as the wind. They were heading down the fifth floor corridor, racing past the astonished Griffindors straggling back to the tower. Some were clapping as she danced ahead.

"Gotcha!"

Lilly yelped. For all his unseemliness, she forgot sometimes how quick he could be. His strong arms wrapped around her stomach, pulling her to a stop.

"Little _thief!_" He chided, but she heard the mirth in his voice.

"Don't know _what_ you're talking about."

"Lilly…" butterflies flew out of her middle as he held her tighter, pulling her up so she squirmed.

"Put me down!"

"I will when you give it back!" He said gleefully, jutting his chin over her shoulder.

"Oh, alright, alright, I surrender!" She laughed breathlessly as he set her down. "Now, what was it you wanted?"

"Lilly!"

"Fine!"

She gave a theatrical sigh before reaching into her pocket. It was oddly cold as she wrapped her fingers around it. It might have just been the metal, but as she raised it she realised it was vibrating slightly. Ted smiled smugly, but she drew it away just as he reached to take it.

"You seriously haven't tested this yet?"

"No, and I don't intend to start today."

"Well, why not? Seems as good a time as any."

She absently shifted the dials back and forth with her fingers. She wasn't even sure why she was making an issue of this, but suddenly Ted was anxious again.

"Lilly, please, give it here!"

"Just one little trip?"

It was like a voice had started up in her head; '_go on, go on, go on_'. Pushing her.

"No!" He moved to grab her arm. "Lilly, it'll probably just explode like the last time I fiddled."

"It exploded?"

_Hence the scorch mark._

"Please?"

His grip was firm, but gentle, and she wanted to give in – she was already moving – but something was trying to stop her. Making her thumb twitch as she held it out.

_Go on, go on, go on…_

And there it was. Suddenly her lips ripped into a mad grin, and she pushed the top. The spring clicked. Ted's hand shot out like a snake from a basket around hers and the time turner, his storm eyes wide.

"Lil, what –"

But he never got to finish. The next moment, the two of them were swept away without warning, and into the dark.

* * *

**_A.N: 'Rambling Through the Avenues of Time' is a hilarious song by Flight of the Concords, and I just thought the title was great. Nice metaphor for the state of their romance at this point too, if you listen to the song (from Lilly's point of view, anyway). Cliffhanger! And...Review? Reviews are nice. Reviews make me happy!_**


	5. The Brave Don't Run

_Just a quick thank you to all the reviewers and the favourites, they really make my day!_

**Chapter Four**

_**The Brave Don't Run**_

It was like being sucked through ink-black water, only it was neither hot nor cold. It was suffocating though; compressing. It closed in on all sides until Lilly thought they'd both be crushed with the sheer weight of it. It lasted an eternity, much longer than she thought it would, and the terror ripped a grappling hook in her heart. What if they were lost? The voice had vanished, leaving her with the sudden horror of what she'd done. Were they falling? Just plunging into the emptiness of space, never to return?

It was the worst way to die.

She couldn't breathe. She still felt Ted's hand on hers, the grip like iron, but as the seconds dragged on she felt herself growing fainter and fainter. The black was impenetrable and she saw nothing, heard nothing, no longer sure whether they were falling up or down. Her thoughts spun away like threads of spider silk, whipped by the wind. Everything was collapsing. She couldn't feel her fingers where she clutched the time turner, knowing it had to still be there only because Ted still held on. Her skin felt like it was being flayed away. Her heart was a drum without an echo, getting fainter…

Suddenly a howling clogged thickly in her ears, blocking out everything else in a screaming rush of wind. For a moment there was nothing but chaos, and then there was a jerk; the sense of being pulled on a long cord. They were being dragged up, faster and faster, until –

Solid ground hit her feet like a mine battery. They tore apart, and Lilly felt the floor fly up to meet her.

* * *

The entire world felt as if it were built of gelatine, every movement like ripples in a pond. Ted was reminded painfully of lying on the forest floor as if it were a rolling ship, unable to move. He felt as if his kneecaps had spit, and it took him a moment to remember what had happened.

_Running, Lilly, the time turner…_

His entire body tensed. Suddenly alert, he leapt to his feet. Staggering, but managing to stay upright, he rushed to Lilly's side a few feet away, pulling her protectively into his lap.

"Lilly? Lilly can you hear me?"

"Ted." She sounded like she'd swallowed a pumice stone.

"Are you alright?"

She groaned, but stayed conscious. Ted let go a breath he hadn't realised he'd been holding and stroked her hair with a shaky hand.

"You're alright, then?" She croaked. He tried to smile, but it came out a grimace.

"Suppose I'm just more used to this than you."

She gave a half laugh.

"Probably." She struggled to sit up. "Where are we, then?"

She was smiling with a bright curiosity that covered the fear Ted saw writhing beneath. He felt his heart crack at the sight; whatever the situation, whatever the trouble they were in, Lilly could always see the adventure. There was always a way to have a laugh and still make it out in time for tea, because nothing ever really _bad _could happen. There were a few scrapes and bruises every now and again. Ted was reminded of the time in Wales when James broke his arm and he'd had to rescue him before the tide came in. But they had always come out of those.

His miserable attempt at a smile faded to raw pity as he looked back at her, not even trying to hide his own dread. She raised her eyebrows.

"Alright," she murmured. "_When _are we?"

"No idea."

He raised his head to look around. They were in a dark, cavernous room, full of book shelves that towered out of sight towards the ceiling. Some were made of a dark wood that was almost black, but others were made of metal and glass. All of them were inscribed on the end with a number inlaid in gold foil. Beneath that was a strip of vibrantly coloured metal. As Ted looked around, he realised it must be some sort of cataloguing system and that they were in the 'green' section.

"At least we're not in the middle ages – all this stuff's modern."

"Yeah," he said slowly. There was something about this place, like an anecdote in a history book or an old photo. Something…familiar. Though, in truth it was hard to see anything much in the half-light filtering from the high windows. It had a ghostly blue tinge that reminded him of the glow just before dawn. Enough to see; not enough to see fine detail.

"Lumos."

He turned sharply to Lilly who had her wand arm extended toward the gloom. It lit the thick base of the nearest shelves where they were fused to the floor.

"What do you reckon this is?"

He raised an eyebrow.

"I mean _apart _from a library!"

Her voice carried. Now it was louder it made an echo and suddenly Ted was nervous. He felt a prickling at the back of his neck as his instincts woke up and sniffed. Something was wrong. Out of well-entrenched habit, he glanced quickly up and around, his arm tightening around Lilly's shoulders.

"Ted, what –"

"Dim your wand."

"Why?"

"Just do it!" His own voice he dropped to an urgent whisper. With barely another sound, she muttered the counterspell and they stood, Ted moving his arm to take her elbow.

"We should head for the door."

He tried to sound confident and reassuring, but it didn't quite come off as the feeling under threat came closer. He was trying to think of a plan, but there was very little they could do other than hide in the shadow of the bookcases. There was already enough light to see their shapes at a distance, and they were far too out in the open.

"Ted, what's wrong?"

He shook his head and shrank them back. Suddenly he heard the infinitesimal hiss of a cloak rasping against the stone and yanked them into a narrow aisle. Safe in the shadows, they peered around the end of the row. For a second, Ted thought he'd been being paranoid, and that these were just the wardens of the library. They'd come out and have an awkward conversation before going home. _Trying _to go home. Or make a game of it – it was always so with Filch when James and Lilly dragged him into one of their escapades. They'd run and he'd chase, before the lot of them were caught running in the corridors by Professor McGonagall. Oh, and then Lilly would flash her big, innocent eyes and they'd go their way, no harm done.

But as his eyes adjusted to the distance, he saw something that made his heart freeze. It was two men. Both were tall and imposing, hooded and cloaked in black, their masks glinting in the eerie light.

Death eaters.

_Oh…shit._

They'd seen pictures, many and varied. There were whole books published on the evil they wrought. Somehow, though, Ted had never quite imagined being faced with one, much less cornered by _two_ in a dark place with nowhere to run. When at last she saw them properly, he felt Lilly shudder.

"_How can they be here?_" She breathed hoarsely. "_How?_ Ted?"

"We need to move." He hissed back, getting a hold of himself. "Now, come on!"

He pulled them down the aisle, wheeling them around the other side where they broke into a run. Ripping past the fall of blue light, they made it a handful of rows before Ted pulled them into another aisle. Still with her behind him, he crept to the edge of the gap and peered out, risking no more than his nose.

The two men were still walking up the main thoroughfare, their pace calm and confident. Suddenly he frowned. The sense of familiarity was increasing as the light got higher – soon they were going to run out of shadows – but there was something…

"Ted –"

"I know where we are!" He said suddenly. "We're in the archives at the department of mysteries."

He turned back so he could lean against the shelf.

"We're at the ministry."

"Why didn't you recognise it before?"

"It's a big library," he shrugged. "Spent most of my time in one of the other sections."

She turned to back stare at the wide gap. It separated their rows from another set almost exactly the same, running parallel for another fifty meters before the opposite one curled away. Then after a few meters they resumed, like a giant corridor made of dominoes.

"Do you know where the door is?" She asked quietly.

Ted stared at her for a whole minute, heart sinking to his stomach.

"I think it's behind them."

Lilly's eyes widened. They both craned their necks around the edge to watch the cloaked figures. They were getting nearer, but they didn't seem to be alerted to their presence. They looked to be keeping an eye out for something, now and again glancing down the shelves as if expecting to see something. They had no urgency, however, and they made no attempt to hide themselves as they went. Then a voice like gravel carried to them, lifting over the layer of gloom near the floor.

"I told you it was a wild goose chase."

"Do you question the wisdom of the Dark Lord?"

The second voice was high and cold, laced with a palpable dislike for his companion.

"Of course not! But even _he_ wasn't sure anything would come of it!" The first man sounded irritated. "I mean, he sends us to have a look. We look. He doesn't say why, and we don't ask, but he doesn't seem all that put out about us finding nothing either."

"That is no reason to discontinue our patrol. Snivelling coward." The second hissed as an afterthought. The first visibly bristled.

"I am no coward, Malfoy! I simply have the necessity of going to _work_ today in this nest of blood traitors!"

"As do I, you miserable wretch, but _I_ am not constantly _whining_ about it like a lost schoolgirl! If, however, you are unhappy with our current assignment, I would be _more_ than happy to bring it up with the Dark Lord at our next meeting…"

"That is unnecessary."

"Good! Then kindly keep your opinions to yourself and complete the task at hand!"

"S'pose I'd be cranky too if I'd been sent down here at the crack of dawn." Lilly muttered. Ted shot her a glare that instantly made her fall quiet. The death eaters were very close now, exactly where they'd been when they first landed. Malfoy…Scorpius' grandfather. It had to be, only when he'd been working for Voldemort. But still working at the ministry – before it was overrun.

They hadn't gone back as far as he feared they might have, but they'd still gone a long way.

If they could only wait; hide until they finished their patrol and were forced to leave. It wasn't the best solution, but it was at least better than facing the two of them. Or trying to bolt and getting caught anyway. The death eaters were still ignorant, and if it could just stay…

The second one froze. With a flick of his wand, the mask dissipated into smoke, the better to see what he had spotted on the ground. He bent down, and when he straightened up he was holding something silvery that dangled on a long chain. Lilly squeaked.

"Oh my god, I dropped it!"

"Well, well, what have we here?" His long blond hair caught the brightening light. "Not so wild a goose, wouldn't you say?"

"Well, why did they leave it lying around for us to find then?"

Lucius Malfoy's eyes flicked through the shadowed room, taking in the army of bookcases. Then he uttered the words that made Ted's heart nearly stop.

"Because they're still here."

"Ted, I'm so sorry!"

Her eyes shone with unshed tears.

"It seems you dropped this!" Malfoy called into the gloom. "Why don't you come out and we can talk about giving it back!"

_We're dead. Oh, god – _

"Lilly, I want you to run."

She shook her head in horror as the words spilled out if his mouth.

"It doesn't matter where, just pick a direction and don't stop until you find the door."

Inside his was breaking apart. The fear was like a black wall that rose out of his gut to smother his lungs. He fought to think rationally, but it was like holding up a mountain. Lilly just stood still with disbelief as he tried to turn her back.

"I'm not going anywhere!"

"You have to go for help – go!" He pushed her back along the bookcase and away from the broad avenue, fear naked in his eyes. Then he turned away to face it. He was trembling. His hand was quaking as it drew his wand. If Harry could have seen him now, Ted would have been ashamed for how afraid he was. But he couldn't quell the terror. This was insane. Absolutely and utterly insane. There was no _way_ this was going to come off. He wanted to feel emboldened; feel the courage that came from protecting other people, but it never came. He just felt unbearably alone as Lilly retreated into the ragged shadows.

"Come, now! I'm sure we can come to an equitable accord! Or would you like us to come and find you?"

He had no plan, no idea, and he really didn't want to die. That was the truth. He might have felt like death only a day before, but right now he feared it like any sane person with something to live for. Yet there was only one thing he really could do. The rational part of him still prattling away _knew_ what he had to do, even if his coward's heart didn't. He took a rattling breath and, against every instinct that screamed at him, stumbled out into the open. He nearly tripped over his feet, catching himself just in time.

_Right: panicking, shaking, shit scared _and_ I nearly just fell flat on my face in front of two death eaters. Nice start!_

"Ah! See, my friend, we can be reasonable!" Malfoy smiled in a way that made him resemble a snake. "No need for unpleasantness."

The first death eater snickered as Ted came further into view, still not quite able to make his feet work. Out of habit, he shoved his hands into his robe pockets, punching a hole in the right one with his wand. His whole body felt cold. He stopped about ten feet away and mustered a glare.

"Now you, young man, have piqued my curiosity. Might I ask who you are?"

"Does it matter?"

Malfoy chuckled.

"No, I suppose it doesn't at that. What does matter, however, is that you tell me where your companion is."

It was a good thing Ted was already white as a sheet. Any blood still in his face left it like applying an ice pack.

"There is no one else." He hissed, but it was barely audible and so cracked with his dry throat that it sounded like he'd gargled glass. Even a child could have spotted the lie.

"Oh? And you expect me to believe you came in here all by yourself?"

"I'm a little bit of a genius like that, yeah."

He wasn't sure why he chose to bring that up at a time like this. He didn't usually believe it himself, much less proclaim it to other people. The way Malfoy said it, though – like he was a kid with a pretty toy – made him bristle. He straightened up somewhat, tilting his head back as Malfoy laughed.

"I see!" His eyes glittered maliciously. "Well, of course, that changes everything!"

Ted just glared, waiting for him to stop.

"Ah, but forgive me if I am not quite convinced."

"Why do I need to convince you of anything?" Ted shrugged nonchalantly, but felt the fear rise back as Malfoy advanced, the sneer morphing into a snarl.

"Because you are not quite the one we were expecting to find."

He was a hand span away when Ted saw the other draw his wand. Suddenly he was shaking uncontrollably, his heart painful in his frozen ribs. His senses were on fire, every instinct telling him to run, _run now_, get _away_.

"Clearly."

The lips curled in disgust.

"So I'll ask you again. _Where_ is your companion?"

Ted doubted he could've got his tongue to work even if he'd wanted to, much less his numb lips. Malfoy sighed heavily.

"Pity," his voice was like soft down. "But you _will_ tell us."

Ted unstuck his jaw enough to spit out a word.

"Unlikely."

"Oh," Malfoy tutted. "So be it."

There was a split second when everything went totally blank. Ted could hear the dust spiralling round the ceiling; smell the leather beneath Malfoy's robes. He could hear his own heart, racing to beat enough times in a second to cover the beats it would lose in the next. But he couldn't see. Nothing in his line of vision registered in his brain. It was like looking at a painting and being unable to understand a single portion of it. All the colours had turned to grey, the edges blackened as if they'd been smudged.

And that's when he felt it. A wave of silvered horror, blinding him to thought and reason like nothing else had. It was like he'd been emptied out and filled back up with a sickly rime, pouring from him like smoke.

The world went into slow motion. He felt the two men raise their wands to him; heard their breath pull to utter the incantations. His hands slid out of his pockets without him really noticing much but the weight. His heart emptied. So this was how he was going to die. _This_ was how he'd honour his parents.

He deserved the sneer. He deserved the disgust.

A flash of wildfire hair crossed his mind's eye. It was like a phoenix flapping through his vision, though there was no one else whose hair it could've been. The girl who'd never back down.

Something clicked.

It was like a switch in his brain. With a speed he didn't know he possessed, it propelled him backwards and angled him into the rows on his left. He hit the floor without feeling it, hearing the spells erupt into lightening a hairsbreadth above his head.

Then it all rushed back: the room, the pain, the death eaters –

He was on his feet and hurtling down the bookshelves without waiting to look. His shoulder stung where it had impacted the stone and his ears rang, but he ignored both as he fell out onto another wide path. Sprinting up it, he heard the Malfoy's cry of frustration and the whooshing of his move to pursue. He ducked, weaving round to put the shelves between them and him. His feet pounded as he zigzagged across the surface, haring in another direction the moment he heard movement ahead. They were closing, but he was quick. Quicker than he ever thought he could be. He scrambled and dodged, not knowing or caring where he was going.

They seemed to be heading towards the centre. Where he'd thought the different rows were parallel, they seemed to be more like giant spokes. Each tapered closer as they neared a common epicentre, broken every now and again by little alcoves and workspaces. He burst upon one where the bookshelves curved outward to accommodate a large statue set on a thick square of stone. It looked like a woman, but with huge bat-wings curling downwards from her back, crowned with a helmet made of bronze. Its nose piece resembled an eagle's beak.

Ted lurched to a stop, completely winded. His gaze was drawn to the eyes of the statue, which were blank of all detail. Yet they seemed to stare at him, watching his every move.

"IMMOBULUS!"

The spell hit the base past his right knee. The corner shattered, sending up a cloud of dry dust.

_Why that spell should never be used on a rigid object, _Ted thought absently, bolting forward with a fresh rush of adrenaline and slamming his shin on the edge. He gasped in pain, but hadn't the breath for anything else. He heard one of the death eaters swing overhead and tore to the side, rounding the corner. On impulse, he sent a stunner over his shoulder and heard it smash into wood.

"Oh, so he has teeth!"

The first death eater laughed like a hyena before sending a binding curse that shot beneath his right arm. He felt the ripple of wind as it passed and choked back his cry of shock. Putting on a new burst of speed, he flung himself past the last row and into the hub. Before him was a column that must have been more than six feet across, made up entirely of shelves. Surrounding it were writing desks, each equipped with its own green-shaded lamp.

There were seven paths in front of him leading away. Spinning round, he screamed at the onrush of black smoke.

"VENTUS!"

It was little more than wind, pressurised into a spike and fired at the target, but it had the desired effect. He heard a scream as the death eater was knocked out of the air. Ripping back round, he lunged onward, diving to avoid the countering barrage. The heat from the blasts was like lit matches as they raced past his ears, ricocheting off of the centre. Suddenly something ploughed into the floor in front of him, forcing him to veer to the side and smash headlong into one of the desks. With a crash, he toppled over it, bits of glass lashing into his arm as the light broke.

The first death eater yelled in triumph, but it was cut short as Ted scrambled to use the upturned desk as a shield. The first curse hit it with a thud, allowing him to spring to his feet and fly down a new path. The man howled in fury as Ted raced between the new rows, surprised at how the lines turned sharply to point suddenly straight. As he ran, he caught glimpses of the other spokes and realised they were all running in the same direction.

With a yell, he flung himself into the nearest aisle. Something whipped past the place where he'd just been, but he didn't look to see what it was. He fell out the other side and was about to bolt back the way he'd come when he collided heavily with something. It screamed.

"Ted?"

"Lilly!"

A hex shot out of the aisle, forcing them to duck.

"RUN!"

"CONFRINGO!"

Ted didn't know who shouted it, but suddenly both of them were thrown clear across the floor. The heat seared like a bolt of lightning as he crashed into the side of the nearest shelf, knocking his skull with a thudding crack. His limbs bundled under him, and for a moment he was paralysed as he tried to untangle himself. He could barely see for the flash that had burned through his eyes. Nausea rippled from the side of his head and his ears rang.

He groaned. He tried to look round for Lilly, but it was impossible to see a thing. Wood and metal and glass littered the floor and floated to the ground amidst the hanging cloud of white dust. The dust only compounded the lack of light, and suddenly it was a challenge to see a foot in front of his face. He unstuck his arms long enough to launch himself onto his front, and coughed as the dust clogged his throat.

He could still hear curses through the mist, but everything wavered. It was like being underwater. Suddenly he heard something much closer and forced himself onto all fours, hauling himself to his feet as he scrambled away. He kept going. He lurched along as best he could, but only because stopping was unthinkable. He plunged through the cloud until it thinned and ended, revealing at last what the rows had been heading towards.

A wide gap separated the last shelves of each line from a huge wall. It was made entirely of white metal, blinding after the gloom. And as Ted approached, he realised it wasn't a wall at all, but a colossal storage cabinet. It was punctuated with crank wheels at regular intervals, all controlled by a master lever at the end. He'd seen the like in museums. Gasping for breath, he jogged to a halt round the next set of shelves and staggered backwards, mouth hanging.

"CRUCIO!"

"What –"

* * *

Lilly was running. The moment she'd lost sight of Ted, she'd slipped off her shoes and skittered back down the way they'd come. Without them, she could run almost silently and leapt down the rows. As they flashed past, she caught sight of the death eaters at the other end of one of the aisles and tore on. She half expected a cry of surprise, and nearly died when she heard Malfoy's voice pierce the air. She fell into a huddle at the end of the bookcase, arms clamped around her knees.

Then she realised it was for Ted, and her heart skipped a beat.

_Moron! What the hell?!_

What was he thinking? Help – they needed help. He'd told her to go for help…

She was on her feet in a second and off again, glaring through the darkness as if challenging it to reveal the door. Suddenly the rows on both sides curved inward, the lines swerving dizzyingly until they all ended in a crescent shape around a circular portal. The portal was set up on a dais and seemingly led to nowhere. But when Lilly leapt up to the brass frame, she could see the outline of a room beyond, the size of a cupboard. At the back of this there was another door, normal this time except that it was black.

_Help._

Hesitantly, she pushed through the shimmering barrier. It was like stepping beneath a warm air current, and suddenly there was a wall on either side of her. She opened the black door and was met with the circular floor.

_Okay, who the _FUCK _designed this place?_

She'd been to the ministry once or twice before with her father and had even seen the rotating doors once. Which was lucky, really. Raising her wand, she called "Ostium Manifesto". After a moment, the door on her second left flew open to reveal the underground corridor to the department of mysteries. For one wild moment, she was tempted just to make a run for it. To leave and put as much distance as humanly possible between her and _them_.

But the brave don't run. Apparently. Or was that 'the foolish don't run'? In any case, she sent out a mute patronus in the hopes that someone would notice and whipped back around. Maybe it would find someone helpful – her father said patronuses were odd that way. And it'd lead them back for certain if she was in trouble.

Without losing a second, she pelted down what seemed to be the main avenue and toward the sound of shouting. The light was getting higher, but that really only made it worse since it revealed the veritable maze. Aiming for the noise, Lilly moved as fast as her legs could take her, but they were always ahead, and she never saw them. There were flashes from behind the bookcases, but they were erratic, first here and then there.

At least that meant Ted was giving them a merry chase.

She risked a look over her shoulder. The way behind was still empty. Was help coming? Suddenly there was a blast on the other side of the row to her right, so close she could see the shrapnel. Panicking, she cowered against the end of one of the bookcases until they'd passed. She heard a cry of pain and shut her eyes tight, fighting the urge to put her hands over her ears. She was still curled up when the sounds grew distant, shivering with shock.

_You coward. And what were you planning to do this time?_

Burning with shame, she scrambled jerkily to her feet and backed against the metal.

_Someone _had _to be coming._

It was the only thought that gave her peace. The only thought that stilled the hurricane in her head; everything else was tossed into a blur. Her ears shot up as she recognised Ted's bellow, and then shied as something hit the shelves high above. Smoke trickled down the wood as the man materialised. He swore to high heaven before plummeting to the floor in a mess of black robes and blonde hair. Malfoy seemed too pre-occupied with his chest to notice her, but she didn't need further prompt. Dashed away to her right, she sliced between the bookcases as they skirted round. He was in the air again before she could blink, but she didn't know where. She ducked, and broke away across the hub, leaping lithely over the upturned table.

She wondered again who the _hell _designed it all as she caught sight of the central column. Whoever it was must have been a monumental wacko – or just a board architect playing dominoes. Actually she could envision that…

There was a flash on the periphery of her vision, followed by another and then a third. Racing round into one of the gaps, Lilly shot like an arrow in their direction. The least she could do was provide some distraction, if nothing else. She wasn't completely helpless.

_They _are_ coming._

The soles of her feet were stinging with the impact of the hard floor. It was worse than all day in the studio and she was starting to skid with the slipperiness of her tights. Usually it was something she enjoyed, but as she ran now she cursed it with everything she had. Her hair flailed around her face as she turned a sharp bend, bounding into a row. She could hear the spells being fired up ahead, their sparks bouncing off one of the aisles in front of her.

Gritting her teeth and bearing them like a hissing cat, she flew out of the row, hair trailing like a firestorm behind. Then suddenly it was as if the floor had turned to ice. With a yell, she slid forward and smack bang into someone coming the other way.

She screamed, fighting to steady herself and aim her wand. Then she saw the face.

"Ted?"

"Lilly!"

Inside her ears seemed to fill with fog. Ted yelled something at her, but the next second Malfoy's voice screamed something from behind her. A spell like a miniature star shot past them and hit the shelves behind, bursting into a fireball before either of them could move. Ted was ripped away from her and she tried to scream as she was flung backwards, inhaling a mouthful of splinters. She hit the shelves opposite like a rag doll, the impact sending a spike up her spine. She couldn't breathe. Every move was agony, but at least she could and that meant nothing was broken.

Coughing violently, she crawled and slid to her feet, broken glass pressing into her palms. She tried to shake her head of the ringing in her eardrums, but it persisted like a bell.

"Ted!" Her throat felt like burnt treacle. "Where are you?"

Suddenly there was movement in front of her, rising out of the dust.

"Hello, girlie!"

Her brain stopped working. It was as though she was a rabbit caught in car headlights and for the second time in two days, she felt pinned. As surely as an entomologist pinning a beetle. The first death eater cackled with delight.

"STUPIFY!"

She shot the stunning spell with as much force as she could and ran, tearing down the thoroughfare like a stabbed rat. She could hear the death eater following her and danced into another spoke, swearing as she hit the hub. She barely avoided being hit by the full body bind as she tore into the main spoke back to the portal, skipping over the debris.

She wasn't fast enough.

Even as she galloped round the corner, she could hear faint movement ahead as another curse forced her into the middle. Out in the open, she spun around with and impediment jinx, but he deflected it easily. He must have lost his mask at some point during the explosion, and suddenly she could see the merciless black eyes; the straggled beard. He laughed as she aimed another hex at him, breaking it apart before it got near him.

With a yell, Lilly turned to run, knowing it was pointless the moment she started. The death eater roared with glee and raised his wand.

Something crossed her face. At first glance, she thought it was a unicorn, as absurd as that was. It shone bright enough to be one. But then she realised it was the wrong shape, and that she could see _through_ it. Crying out in shock, she realised it was the winged horse of her patronus as it charged the death eater, throwing off his aim. It was gone a moment later, but she was already turning back to where had come from.

Four columns of white light plunged to the floor before her eyes. They materialised into three men and a woman, three with their wands drawn and pointing straight at her. The fourth did it with a wickedly gnarled staff. Lilly froze, but she wasn't the only one. All four of them stared at her with abject disbelief, the two men on the right looking as her if she'd sprouted antennae.

"Wha…"

The spell broke with a whip crack and Lilly whirled back to the death eater. He roared in rage, face twisted and flushed an ugly purple. He was still aiming at her as she dived to the floor, flattening herself as the storm broke. Four stunners shot over her head and she heard the man behind howl in pain. When she looked up, he was on the floor, unmoving.

"Get up!"

Her head snapped back to the man with the staff.

"Get up, now!"

None of them had lowered their wands. Breathing hard, Lilly pushed herself to her feet in the sudden deafening silence.

"Who the hell are you?"

Lilly stared. The man with the fair hair on the gnarled-staff-man's left seemed to have found his tongue. The long-haired bloke with the moustache next to him still just gawped at her, mouth hanging like a trapdoor. She felt like she'd seen both of them before, though she knew for certain she'd never met them. She could feel the cold sweat sticking in her hair.

"Answer me!" He hissed urgently.

"Uh," Lilly raised a hand to her hairline, mouth stuck open as she tried to take it all in. Yes, she'd seen them before. Hundreds of times. In the photos in the hallway at home. There was no _way_ –

A scream split the air behind her like a thunderclap in an amphitheatre. It pealed and twisted, going on and on. It mingled with the echoes until it was as if the whole air was begging for release.

"Ted!" She gasped, forgetting everything else as she turned.

* * *

It was like the world had been lit on fire. Very cell in his already ravaged body felt as if it was being slowly ground into paste, whilst the rest of him was stuck with white-hot pins. He couldn't see. He couldn't think. Everything in his whole life had been seemingly compressed into a small stone as the rest of him bore the storm raging around it. It was like almost nothing he had ever felt, even after the change and the feeling of every bone shattering and reshaping.

_FUCK OH FUCK, FUCK!_

He tried to clamp his mouth shut to stop the words coming out. But they were unintelligible anyway, and after a while he stopped trying. He felt his body spasm around him, but it was far away; distant. At least compared to the liquid magma that seared through his heart and blood. It grew rather than faded in intensity, flashing his mind to a dark crimson like dragon's blood. It ripped from him the twisted screams that rose out of his chest, burning the inside of his throat while the rest of him was boiled away.

Then it released him, and he dropped back, panting, onto the floor.

"Oh, come now, that wasn't even a minute!" Malfoy shrieked.

"I've had worse." He breathed, words slurring. It was almost true. The death eater's laugh came softly.

"I'll show you the meaning of pain." He stepped forward so he towered over Ted's shuddering form. "We will find her. And then you will die."

His back arched unnaturally as the spell hit him again. Waves of agony attacked his nerves like an army of burrowing parasites, biting and nibbling until he was sure they were in his brain. He writhed uncontrollably, tasting the blood in his mouth. His ears registered noise he had never heard before; cries that sounded like they'd been pulled from hell. And Malfoy was laughing like a lunatic, flicking his wand again and again.

_Please, god fuck, please PLEASE!_

The world faded. He wanted the pain to stop; just wanted it to _stop_ because it was like being pulled apart atom by atom.

_FUCKING god, PLEASE!_

Like being burned alive so that one layer was removed at a time.

_PLEASE!_

He would have begged – he knew it in his crumbling bones, but he couldn't get his tongue to work. It flapped uselessly as if he was having a fit.

_I would have begged._

A howl wrenched itself from his gut and erupted from his mouth like the sound of a dying beast. And more came. He was being wrenched open and the wolf stirred, screaming with him. His eyes flashed with a feeling like humming and his fingers burned. He scrabbled madly at the floor, digging his claws in and bellowing as the blood flowed. Malfoy gasped in horror somewhere above him.

It was as if he'd always been in pain. There was nothing before. The stone shattered and the pieces flew apart like leaves in the wind. His eyes flew wide open, blown pupils staring at nothing, the humming clear behind them.

_Oh god, Lilly…_

Then it was all over. The sensation was like having a ton of water drop suddenly onto his body, driving him into the ground. His ears drew a blank. Every portion of him ached; his eyes, his limbs. The bits that hurt the worst were his throat and hands, both of which felt like they'd been shredded. His eyelids flickered open and closed as he tried to focus against the dark, but it was hard. Where had the pain gone? The humming had retreated by the time he managed to crack his eyes open.

They met a pair of soft irises in bottle-green.

"Lil?" His swollen tongue curled naturally around the word, though he couldn't hear his own voice saying it. His throat burned. He raised a bloodied hand to touch her face. A hissing started in his ears. He imagined he was underwater again as the blurry sounds started to trickle back. Lilly's lips moved. She was mouthing his name. As the volume turned up, he collapsed back against the stone, black clouding his eyes. The last thing he heard was Lilly's beautiful tongue.

"Help him…please."

* * *

**_A.N: The title is for New Zealand's Midnight Youth's debut album. No cameo song, but I thought it was an appropriate description of what must have been playing at the back of their minds after hearing stories about the war and their parents. 'Ventus' is latin and translates closely to 'wind' and 'air'. Also, have a GUESS who the cavalry was! And cavalry's a good song on The Brave Don't Run (don't own it btw just in case). Reviews if you liked it?_**


	6. Temporal Mechanics

_You know, I can't get over how people are actually reading my stuff, it's amazing! And thanks for the reviews, once again!_

**Chapter Five**

_**Temporal Mechanics**_

"_Get him on the sofa – Tonks, get me Dumbledore."_

"_You could be gentler, Mad-eye!"_

"_This isn't the time for gentle! Kitchen, NOW!"_

"_Do you think it was wise bringing them back here?"_

"_And what else were we going to do, Moony? Just leave him lying there?"_

"_Of course not, but in case you haven't noticed we just brought two possible death eaters back to Order Headquarters!"_

"_Oi, you two! Stop prattling and give me a hand!"_

"_You really think they're death eaters?"_

"_What other explanation is there?"_

"_Well…I haven't got one! But have you ever heard of dark magic doing something like this and _us _not being able to tell?"_

Thump.

"_You, my friend, are just determined to see the ghost of what _isn't_ there."_

"_Just as you are determined to be blind to it!"_

"_Sirius –"_

"_He's getting paler. And sweating like a horse, Remus –"_

"_Mad-eye, we're going to need to call Madam Pomfery."_

"_Why, what's going on? Who's he?"_

"_Fred! George! Get back to bed, this isn't –"_

"_You can't just –"_

"– _order us back to bed!"_

"_What's all this shouting?"_

"_Hermione –"_

"_And who the bloody hell's the girl in the bathroom?"_

"_I thought that was Ginny!"_

"_Quiet!"_

Silence.

"_Remus, I think he's in trouble here."_

"_And, who is it that is 'in trouble', Mr Black?"_

* * *

A ghost with green eyes stared back at her out of the mirror. She recognised the matted tangle of red hair and quickly found a hairbrush to tame it out. She was still in uniform. It wasn't something she'd really considered while running around the archive, but now she saw it she acknowledged its strangeness. At least she didn't have the tie – unlike Ted.

_Probably helps it's red and gold, at least._

She also still had her leotard on underneath, clammy with sweat. In fact the whole ensemble was dirty and grimy with all the ash and dust. She found more than a few splinters as she hacked through her hair.

_How are we going to get out of this?_

The question burned on a flaming merry-go-round in her head. It slowly drove her spare. She tried to think of things to say, but failed miserably.

_Hello, we're your children from the future? _

No, when she thought about it, that wasn't strictly speaking the _best _opening line. And she'd need to get the exact date first. _And_ it was already obvious that they weren't going to believe a word she said.

Her gaze met the mirror's again, and suddenly it was as if she was seeing someone else entirely. The woman in the old photograph, her white dress fluttering, her friends and the love of her life by her side. The woman who was her grandmother and her namesake and who, for the first time in her life, she wished she didn't look the twin of. Just because her mum had red hair…

They'd been so shocked at her appearance. And then when they saw Ted, she thought Sirius had been about to faint. He'd gone a disconcerting shade of grey and yelped alarmingly at the sight of him writhing on the floor. No-one missed the contortion of his appearance, though mercifully no one said a word. Malfoy scarpered the minute he saw them.

For a split-second, Lilly thought the eyes would open with the eerie amber-green of the Wolf. The effects were retreating, but she was terrified for a moment that the creature would still be there, staring back at her. Then when she'd run to his side, she'd been met with the storm-grey that was unmistakably Ted. She'd screamed his name, and he'd whispered hers. His voice had been all but gone. She'd shot a look back to see varying degrees of horror, though none more than the man with the shoulder-length dark hair. He'd looked like he'd seen a ghost.

_A real ghost, anyway, _she thought wryly at the mirror image. _I'm just a reflection._

Someone flashed past the open door. Jumping slightly she leaned around the frame.

"Err…hello?"

"What?"

She spun to see the red-haired boy on the landing behind her. His face was clean shaven, the red was solid and there were no lines, but there was no mistaking her Uncle Ron.

"Who are you?"

"Um –"

The shouting increased downstairs as the _crack_ of Fred and George apperating whipped back to them. Ron darted past her and she danced after him, hanging back as he joined the girl who'd gone by earlier. Aunt Hermione. Rose had hair just like her; it was eerie.

It all seemed to be descending into chaos as the kids tried to make their voices heard. She snuck in behind the rest to try and see what was happening, light as a shadow in the lamplight. Suddenly Sirius shouted for everyone to be quiet and she caught sight of Ted lying prone on the couch.

"Remus, I think he's in trouble here."

Without a second thought, she dashed to his side round the back of the settee and gasped at the sheen of sweat coating his face. Her eyes met Sirius' as he looked up. They looked lost and upset where Remus' had been suspicious. Holding herself in with an effort, she tried her upmost not to cry.

"And, who is it that is 'in trouble', Mr Black?"

Lilly couldn't help it that her jaw dropped. It was a voice she never expected to hear, much less in the same room and at the same time a few feet away. Dumbledore looked every bit the balmy old man in the pictures; the half-moon glasses, the twinkling blue eyes, the beard –

"I think he took a knock to the head."

Lilly swallowed at the rising colour and swelling on the side of his face. It looked ghastly blotched onto the sickly pallor of his skin.

"Is he going to be alright?" She sounded _so_ childish. She hated it. Like a toddler begging its parent for answers. Everyone looked at her and she felt the weight of confusion like a brick wall suspended over her head. Remus looked as if he was torn between anger and pity and at a loss for both. But it was he who moved around the couch to put a hand on her shoulder.

"We'll do what we can, but you must first be honest with us."

"For god's sake, Remus, don't you think she's been through enough?"

"Sirius!" His hand was shaking even as the eyes fought to keep the emotions at bay, desperation sparking them as he turned to Sirius. The man crouched by Ted's side gave him a hard look in return, but fell silent. Everyone seemed to hold their breath. Then Remus asked the question they all wanted answering. Lilly felt the piercing gaze of the old man as if he sought to look right through her.

"Who are you?"

"Umlilly." She mumbled, spirit curling in on itself.

"I'm sorry?"

"Lilly." She said clearly after a deep breath. The bricks fell. Remus stared back with eyes like saucers and Sirius rose to his feet. She had expected the room to explode and for people to start shouting, but it simply filled with overwhelming disbelief. Her aunt and uncles gawped at her whilst the rest of the room went nearly blank with scepticism. Dumbledore raised his eyebrows.

"Your name is Lilly?" He said pleasantly.

"That's right." Lilly felt as if her tongue had turned to lead. "I'm, uh…"

_Eloquence under pressure. _Remus backed away from her, the anger clearer in his eyes.

"I'm not Lilly Evans though." She said in a rush. "I know I look like her, everyone says it, but I'm just…not. I'm – well, I'm…err…"

_Why was this so difficult?_

She tried to take deep breaths, but they came out as if she'd just run all the way around the library again.

"Might it help knew your full name?"

She swallowed, meeting the electric-blue eyes as solidly as she could.

"My name is…Lilly Luna Potter." She said slowly. "I look like Lilly because, well because she's my grandmother. And, 'cos mum had red hair as well, but that's another thing."

"Grandmother?" Sirius repeated. Dumbledore gave the smallest of smiles as her eyes slid over to his.

"Yeah."

"_Grandmother?_"

"_Red hair?_"

She couldn't resist grinning as Ron's expression turned to horror.

"Not that I'm complaining. I rather like ginger!"

"You're lying."

Just like that. No bells and whistles or ill-concealed testing. Just like Ted. The thought threatened to spill the tears as she looked to Remus.

"I know it sounds surreal, but," her voice cracked and she looked down. When her eyes flicked up again, they saw the welling sorrows reflected back at her.

"I am who I say I am. Dose me, and I'll tell you the same thing. I am Lilly Potter."

The man sagged. Sirius looked at him in alarm before training his gaze back to her.

"Lilly's granddaughter," he said softly, "Lilly the second?"

"I would recommend veritaserum to confirm it, headmaster."

"On a child, Alastor?"

"She may not be a child, and wouldn't you rather be sure?"

"Oh, very well." Dumbledore sighed. "Contact Severus if you must. I have certain things to attend to as well, if you'll excuse me."

Lilly watched Moody stomp off with the silver-haired wizard before turning back to Remus, his frame leant heavily against the wall.

"You okay?"

He blinked. Pushing himself upright with an unsteady hand, he mouthed wordlessly for a bit before giving up. Sirius shot him a wobbly grin and shook his head. A smile twitched the corners of her lips as Remus fell into a chair opposite, eyes burning back with something like awe. Her own felt watery, but she wiped them forcefully with the back of her sleeve. This wasn't the time to cry. Least it wasn't the time for _her_ to cry – she didn't know about the two marauders as they struggled to come to terms with her. Both were taking it a bit hard, though they seemed to start calming down.

It felt as if the tension were falling away when a groan lifted from the couch.

The smile fell away like a stone in water. She was back by his side in a second, pressing herself over the back of the settee to reach his hand.

"Ted…"

"Lil," he scrunched his eyes shut. "You're okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." She responded quickly. "We're safe."

"Malfoy…"

"Buggered off the second he caught sight of us."

"_Us?_"

Lilly hesitated. He sounded as weak as he looked.

"I got help."

He nodded, sighing slightly.

"That's good."

His face tilted back down, body limp.

"Ted? Oi, mate, stay with me!"

He mumbled something into the upholstery while Lilly insistently gripped his hand. He was shivering badly, the sweat glistening off his neck. After an age, he looked back up blearily.

"Wonder what Malfoy was so pissed off about."

Her lips twitched.

"I think you broke his ribs."

Shudders wracked his body as he laughed, the storm eyes fluttering near the ceiling.

"Imagine that."

"What's wrong with him?"

"He's probably got a cracked skull, but it's hard to tell. I hope Poppy gets here soon." Sirius frowned at Ted as he rocked his head back. "Could be a side effect of the cruciatus curse as well."

"Or just that piled on top of everything else."

"What do you mean?"

Suddenly the doors flung open as the nurse burst through. She let out a small cry as she saw the ailing seventeen-year-old.

"What happened?"

"He had the cruciatus curse put on him." Sirius leapt out of the way. "And he got a blow to the head."

Lilly spared a glance to the rest of the room who were looking shocked.

"Right," she barked forcefully, though she looked shaken. "Well, I want everyone to clear out. All of you, out!"

No one moved.

"You heard her!" A new voice shouted in a thick London accent. "Get! Go!"

Remus stood to attention as if snapping out of a trance before helping her herd people through the doors.

"Come on, Padfoot."

"Can't I –"

"OUT!"

"I want to stay with him." It came out faster than she would have liked, but her voice was firm. Madam Pomfery – an astonishingly _young _Madam Pomfery – gave her a pitying look before nodding and shooing her back. Lilly retreated as the rest left, but refused to let go of Ted's hand.

"Oh, dear. Deary me, this isn't good."

"What's wrong?"

"All the nerve ends are firing across the capillary beds on his skin – I'll have to numb them. That will bring down the fever, though this is an odd thing to have happened spontaneously. Has anything like this happened before – to your knowledge?"

"Um," Lilly couldn't take her eyes off Ted's as they rolled around in their sockets. "He's –"

She hesitated. It felt like a violation of his privacy. Madam Pomfery waited patiently for the answer.

"Well, he transformed the day before yesterday." She said hopelessly. "I mean, you know, into a..."

"Oh, well that explains it." The nurse said briskly, and Lilly silently thanked her for her professionalism. "This is just the body's way of coping with the excess stress. Or, not coping as the case may be. But, if it is merely the aftermath of his condition I don't think he's in any immediate danger. Not with me treating him anyway. The same…I believe…is true for the skull. Yes, that was quite a hard nock, but there doesn't seem to be any permanent damage."

"What about his neck?"

"You're a clever girl." She nodded approvingly. "Yes, the neck's been twisted a little, but nothing a bit of nudging the vertebrae back into place can't cure."

She aimed a burst of light at the base of his ear and he moaned, the bones cracking.

"Is there anything else I should be aware of?"

"Well, I suppose there's the wolfsbane…"

"After three days it should be all but out of his system." She said dismissively.

"Err…not necessarily." Lilly said awkwardly. The nurse stared at her.

* * *

_Out in the corridor, the four teenagers, Sirius, Remus and Tonks were clustered around a handful of extendable ears. It was a strain to hear anything since the two girls were across the room, but bits of the conversation filtered back._

"'_Condition'?" Remus repeated. Sirius shushed him urgently. The next bit was too garbled to hear properly, but none of them missed Madam Pomfery's roar of outrage as it boomed across the room._

"_HOW MUCH?"_

"_It doesn't work otherwise! It doesn't work _with_ it, to tell you the truth."_

"_Well no wonder his body's unable to cope with the strain!" They each looked at each other in confusion. They all heard the nurse's loud sigh._

"_Well, there's nothing for it. This will purge the last of the toxin from his blood, this will dull the pain and keep him under until he recovers and THIS will heal the head."_

"_I think he was already taking that first one."_

"_Well, a bit more can't hurt!"_

_There was the sound of shuffling._

"_What was all _that _about?" Ron whispered._

"_Fred," Sirius asked casually. "How long have you had these listening devices?"_

_The teenagers exchanged a look. Remus covered his eyes with his palm._

* * *

"How is he?"

"Completely out of it. Madam Pomfery said it should last at least four or five hours."

She paused nervously.

"S'pose you've got Snape here?"

"He's off on a mission." Sirius said with obvious dislike. "He shouldn't be back until tonight, apparently."

"Oh."

They were all clustered around the fire in the kitchen, a pot of tea in a silver tea pot sitting proudly on the table.

"What time is it?"

"Something like twenty to seven."

"Okay."

She approached timidly, aware of every eye as she found a seat next to George.

"You know, you really are a dead ringer for Lilly, it's uncanny!" Tonks remarked from her seat opposite. Everyone snapped to stare at her.

"What? I'm just saying…"

"Yeah, I get that a lot."

"But how are you here? I mean –" Ron looked awkwardly round the group. "– unless there's _really_ something we should know about..."

"Honestly, Ronald, she's _our age!_"

"Just checking!"

Sirius laughed, craning around George's other side to catch her eye.

"Well, you're not wrong there, Hermione. Though, stranger things _have_ happened!"

Hermione looked horrified. Before she could protest, Remus came to her rescue.

"Look, I'm sure there's a perfectly rational explanation to all this. Lilly?"

"So you believe me now?" She asked quietly. Everyone looked down for a moment.

"That depends," Sirius said eventually. "How mad is your story?"

"From your point of view it is a bit, um, bonkers."

"Well, then! I don't think any further proof is needed!" He exclaimed happily. Lilly smiled at him.

"So what is the story?" Tonks leaned in with a curious spark in her grey-blue eyes. They were something like Sirius' – a relic of the Black family, she assumed – but they were Ted's exactly. The same hue that reminded her of the sea in a storm.

"Yeah, and who's the other guy?" Fred asked suddenly.

"You haven't told us who he is yet." His twin nodded.

Lilly snapped around to them, eyes narrowed.

"How much did you hear?" She asked flatly. The twins tried to look innocent to cover their surprise, whilst everyone else just looked looked shifty. _Until_ she raised the flesh coloured string to eye level, eyebrow cocked. Twining it around her fingers, she gave them a withering look.

"It was sticking out of your pocket." She said simply. The table erupted.

"How the hell –"

"– did you do that?"

"Oh come on!"

"That's impressive…"

"Sirius!"

"We didn't distinguish much." Remus said quickly, causing everyone to quiet down. "Just pieces here and there."

"Oh," Lilly relaxed back into her seat. "Good."

"Why?" Sirius asked carefully.

"Well," she shrugged uncertainly. "I mean, I just thought he might want to tell you himself."

"That is understandable." Remus said kindly, and Sirius nodded. He stayed staring at her a little too long, though. There was something in his look that was almost like confirming a suspicion, but he didn't voice it. Lilly sighed. Well, she supposed, of all the people who'd notice…

"So," the twins regarded her with mounting respect. "You going to tell us, then?"

"I think Ginny must still be asleep." Hermione said absently. Ron rolled his eyes.

"She complains about _getting _to sleep, then once she _is_ she can sleep through a bloody hurricane!"

"Well, we can always fill her in later." Tonks suggested. "I mean you're gonna have to tell the rest of the Order tonight, anyway."

Lilly nodded, resting her forid on the table as she took a deep breath.

"Take your time."

"Well, this is _probably_ gonna sound more mental than Pettegrew cutting off his finger and turning into Scabbers, but bear with me!" This earned her a few grins. "We're from the future."

* * *

The sounds of a summer morning drifted pleasantly through the drawing room window. Sunbeams glossed over everything they touched, carrying with them the sounds of trees, and sparrows, and traffic on the distant bridge. It would never be _quite_ home. In all other ways, Ted despised cities and had never felt comfortable anywhere without an open sky. Truly, it was the sound of waves that would always lull him to sleep where often nothing else could. The soft breezes of the sea.

He couldn't help but feel a certain nostalgia for London, though. And for the big old house that had occupied so much of the siblings' childhood adventures together. They'd had more in the little wood and in the paddocks with the horses out in Dorset. But that didn't diminish finding the photos in the attic, or the ghoul in the cellar. Once, James had managed to lock Albus in the secret room behind the study with all the creepy artefacts for a whole afternoon.

He grinned dreamily. Those were really the moments you treasured.

He shifted groggily. His hands still felt shaky. Every inch of him ached down to the bone, particularly the left side of his head. As he lifted it, he wondered if the tissue had been injected with stone. Jagged stone. And his arm and leg hurt as well.

Something soft rippled around him as he slowly sat up, and he realised someone had put a blanket over him. At the same time, he registered that someone had removed his shirt to bandage his arm and remove the glass. Sighing, he raised a hand to the uninjured side of his head and clutched it.

_And the day had been going so well._

The cuts twinged. With a low growl, he lurched to his feet and swayed to a standing position, looking for his wand. It had been placed on a side table near the couch. By the light streaming from the window opposite, it couldn't have been later than nine or ten. He kneaded his right eye. _Bits _of the conversation drifted back from before. Had he really broken Malfoy's ribs?

_Is that all you're going to take away? _Some part of him said incredulously. _Think about where you are. About _when_ you are._

Fingers slipping round his temple, Ted concentrated.

_Malfoy. The ministry. Grimmald Place. Help. Malfoy. Death eaters. The Order of the –_

He snapped his head up. And then wished he hadn't. It throbbed. His vision slid in and out of focus and his legs threatened to pull him to the floor, but he stayed determinably upright. He felt a bit sticky, but whatever feverish delirium had taken him before seemed to have passed.

_Thank you werewolf resistance to shock, _he thought ironically, cracking a humourless smirk. The smile vanished a moment later as he stared around.

_Lilly._

There was no sign of his shirt anywhere, but ah well. Grasping his wand, he moved silently out into the hall, careful to notice where he put his feet. Once there, he grimaced. At least when Harry and Ginny called it home they'd kept it in good nick, even if they weren't planning to stay as long as they did. The sight Ted was met with was populated by dim, cracked lamps, peeling wallpaper and anonymous curtains. Not to mention the elf heads mounted on the walls above the banisters and the troll's leg he nearly tripped over.

He quickly recovered and glanced about for signs of life. There appeared to be no one about, though he could smell layer upon layer of comings and goings. The earliest was in the region of two or three months old, but there were too many overlapping to be certain. His sensitive nose picked up the few recurring traces of the people that probably lived permanently, and they seemed familiar.

That was a good sign.

In the back of his head, he was having trouble believing his aching body that they really were in the past. His mind kept concocting hallucinations and elaborate deceptions as cause for reproducing the circumstances; that it was all a _trap_. His hair stood on end. His fingers closed tighter over his wand.

_Lilly._

And yet, it was hard to reproduce exact scents – at least ones that would fool him. There was always some giveaway or a chemical that didn't quite belong. As he moved down the hall, searching for her trace, he examined his instinct for that feeling of being hunted and found none. He winced as his head pulsed.

Suddenly there was a creak on the stair and a drifting scent he knew very well. He would always associate it with daffodils and cooking and kicking him and James out of the shed for dinner.

"Hello, I was just wondering if you knew the location of a blood-stained school shirt?" He had literally no idea why these were the words that came out of his mouth. They were met with a slightly open mouth and raised eyebrows as she looked him up and down.

"Or, you could just, you know, leave it off?" She said casually. Ted blushed and looked down.

"Err," he had never considered himself more than scarred and scrawny. Then again, scars were apparently sexy and he had gained a bit of height and muscle mass over the years running in the forest. The eyebrows raised further, blue eyes shining in the gloom.

"You have no idea how creepy that is, but thank you." He said diplomatically. Someone sniggered. His eyes were drawn to the door down to the kitchen just as it opened. That was all the warning he got before the two identical red-haired boys appeared at his shoulders.

"So you must be Ted!"

"Quite the look indeed!"

"Nothing special if you ask me…"

"Oh, I don't know, George! He really pulls these off…" Fed casually poked the roping white lines that crossed both shoulder blades in one fell sweep.

"Who are you then?"

"Give him a break guys!" Lilly giggled as she leaned in the doorway. Her eyes flicked up to Ginny who still looked uncertain on the stairs. Ted followed her gaze and allowed himself a nervous grin.

"How much did you tell them?"

"I've tried to avoid the major plot developments." She said faintly. "So far."

The smile slipped as he looked back.

"Oh, come on Ted, you'd think we'd already done enough damage smashing up the archive – oh wait, that was mostly you!" Ted raised an eyebrow, eyes stony. "Well, you and the death eaters, my point is a bit more can't hurt!"

It was a point. Talk about the rules of temporal mechanics going out the window…he sighed.

"Alright," he chuckled absurdly, stepping forward to draw her into a hug. "You okay then?"

"I'm _fine_." She replied emphatically. "And you should still be asleep!"

"Oh, Lilly, you of all people should know I'm immune." He said dryly, moving past her to the tea pot. She, understandably, stayed staring at Ginny. They didn't have quite the same hair, he realised: Lilly's was naturally just a little wavier and thicker.

_You really do like her hair…_

_Shut up._

"What do you mean 'avoiding major plot developments'?" He distracted himself with finding a mug while his vision wobbled again.

"Are you quite alright?"

To his surprise, a mug was put into his hands. And suddenly he was aware of the rest of the room and his hands went cold. His mouth went dry, and his heart sped up horribly as he raised his storm eyes to the man who had stood. Ted was lankier by a little bit, but he recognised the sandy hair, minus the grey; the soft mouth. Even the scars, and after that everything was familiar anyway from memorising that face.

"Yes, fine!" He said breathlessly. He tried to stop his jaw dropping as he fell into a seat. After a moment, he registered that the rest of the kitchen were staring at them, Lilly and Sirius smiling.

"I don't get it." Ron said bluntly. Hermione kicked him.

"Well, after the trouble I went through, like hell you were getting out of it!" Lilly announced gleefully.

"Actually, that sounds –"

"– very fair!"

_This is surreal, _circulated through his brain on a cracked loop. _This is…_

"Well, go on!"

He leaned to the side to catch sight of the woman on Remus' other side. She looked back with a burning curiosity, bright and eager. In some ways, she was so unlike the man she married: he had patience and a gentle quiet. Yet behind that were the nerves of steel and the fierce passion that he had heard so much about. That he _hoped_ that he could one day live up to. And yes, there were his nose and his eyes and his ears.

He tried to find something to say, but words failed him. Utterly. Even the twins fell silent as they waited for him to speak.

"Um," Remus said at length. "Might we –"

"Theodore." Ted said suddenly. "Actually only Lilly ever calls me Theodore. It's just Ted. After my granddad."

Waves of comprehension appeared to be hitting everyone at different rates whilst Sirius' eyebrows shot to his forid. Then he grinned and Lilly stifled a giggle.

"Granddad?" Tonks said weakly, ignoring her cousin's wink. Ted smiled.

"Yeah. And, my middle name's for my dad, so…" he paused for a deep breath. "My name's Ted…Remus Lupin." He looked at both of them. "I'm your son."

A pin dropped somewhere.

"Congratulations, mate." Sirius leaned across the table and gave his friend a slap on the shoulder. "Glad to see you and Dora finally come to your senses."

"Bloody hell!" Ron looked as dumbstruck as Remus. Tonks flushed pink. Hermione clapped her hands to her mouth and Ginny gawped. The twins just uttered a unanimous "Wicked!"

"Now," Ted looked imploringly across the table. "Lilly, do you think I could have my shirt back?"

"On reflection, I suppose you've earned it."

"Our son?" Remus asked finally, voice hoarse. Ted inclined his head with a smile, leaning back in the chair. Suddenly they heard the soft sound of a throat being cleared and looked around to Ginny in the doorway.

"Alright," she said slowly. "Um, what did I miss?"

They spent hours talking. The natives of the past wanted to know everything about their lives and about what the future was like. It was assumed that they'd won the war and were now living in a golden age of peace and prosperity. Ted was surprised at how happy they were when they talked of normal things, though. Lilly rambled animatedly about building the house so it had bits sticking out like the Burrow, and moving there so they had real gardens. The fountain Harry built for Ginny's flowerbeds that he'd enchanted and which looked like a white stag.

Upon hearing the truth – which Lilly had successfully omitted, despite having already related some of their adventures – the kitchen really did dissolve into chaos. Ginny went brick red, Hermione squealed, Ron, Fred and George looked horrified and Lilly, Sirius and Tonks had burst out laughing. Ted had smirked at the rest of them, but retained some semblance of dignity for Ginny's sake, as did Remus. When they noticed, the three laughed even more and he'd rolled his eyes, glowing with secret pride.

_So this is having a dad._

And then he felt guilty because Harry had always been the image of, but it wasn't the same.

_Dad. I have a mum and dad._

Somehow, they managed to calm things down by the time Molly and Arthur came round at midday – at which point it started all over again. Mrs Weasley had burst into tears, sweeping Lilly into a wet hug before anyone could stop her.

"Mum!"

"Arthur." Ted said formally, stepping around to shake his hand. "Ted Lupin, nice to meet you. Not that I don't know you already, but that's a bit complicated."

"I'm sure!"

"Oh, you'll like this one, Arthur!" Sirius said delightedly. "He invents things."

"Does he really?"

"Yep –"

"– he built a time turner."

In fact, it was mid-afternoon before any of them had the heart to break it up. The adults had to set up for the meeting that night and Molly startled everyone at about three exclaiming about the library. Apparently, they'd have to do it tomorrow, and everyone groaned. Then as everyone was about part ways, Remus drew him into an embrace. It was the strangest thing for Ted: it felt at once unfamiliar and as though it was something he'd always felt. New and irrevocably native to him, and him alone.

Suddenly it was all too much. He broke away with a soft smile and ascended the stairs first with the feeling of being overwhelmed. The bathroom door prevented anyone seeing the tears – especially Lilly. She was thriving on the experience, for it was one of their more fantastic adventures. But not for him. It was more and wrapped around his heart, though he wouldn't cry in front of her. He ran a bath and washed his face and borrowed clothes of Fred and George. If they'd noticed how red his eyes were, they didn't say anything. That was when it hit him how _tired _he was. He was more weary than he had ever been outside full moon and the aching was back.

No one said a thing when he collapsed onto Fred's bed and fell into dreams of falling and running. And one of waking up with eyes of amber-green…

* * *

_The balmy evening was suddenly piercingly, bitingly cold. They were surrounded by total, impenetrable, silent darkness, as though some giant hand had dropped a thick, icy mantle over the entire alleyway, blinding them. For a split second Harry thought he had done magic without meaning to, despite the fact that he'd been resisting as hard as he could - then his reason caught up with his senses - he didn't have the power to turn off the stars…_

* * *

"_Something has happened, Lucius. I have felt it."_

"_My lord –"_

"_Where are they?"_

"_They have them, my lord. But there is yet still hope – I have the device! And only two came through, one of them I think being just an unfortunate passenger."_

_A sigh rippled softly through the air._

"_And the other?"_

"_A red-haired girl."_

"_And you say you failed to acquire either of them?" The voice spat._

"_No, my lord."_

"_Oh, Lucius." There seemed suddenly a deadly calm. "Do they know what you were seeking?"_

"_I don't think so."_

"_You don't think, or you don't know?"_

"_I don't believe so…"_

* * *

"Ted? Are you okay?"

"Hmm?"

He looked up blearily.

"What time is it?"

"Late."

His eyes focussed slowly on Lilly and her bottle green eyes that glittered with the soft lamplight. She was wearing a denim mini-skirt, black tights and a blue-and-white striped cotton jumper which he assumed she'd got off Ginny. The effect sat remarkably well with her tumbling red hair.

"You look nice."

"Thanks!" Her face split in a smile. "They should be back soon," she said absently. Ted looked confusedly at her.

"Well you know what day it is!" She said with an incredulous grin. "It's the day dad got attacked by the dementors and nearly expelled from Hogwarts!"

Ted raised his eyebrows.

_Bloody hell._

"Only, I was thinking, we ought to be looking at how to get home. Not that this isn't brilliant, but…" she trailed off. Ted looked her right in the eye.

"Have you seen Snape yet?"

"Yeah, and I vouched for you, so you don't have to worry. He wanted you to come down, but Sirius looked like he wanted to punch him and your dad flat out refused. I think everyone else got a bit worried at that point, but he conceded before things got nasty. That was before they left."

There was a pause while Ted breathed slowly out. The smile slipped off her face.

"What?"

"Well, since no one mentioned otherwise, I'm going to work off of the assumption Malfoy still had the time turner _on_ him when he made a run for it. Which…makes us kinda stuck."

"You could build another one?" Lilly said with a nervous laugh.

"I barely know how the other one works! Even _if_ I had it, I don't know if I could get us back. And all this is academic if we bugger up the timeline, right?"

Lilly nodded slowly.

"So, what's the plan then?"

He shrugged with a sad smile.

"No idea."

"You'll think of something." The twitch in her lips jumped back into place and she leaned down to hug him. He nearly broke. She always trusted him, always - even in the worst situations. Even when he was the monster. Even, god help him, when he'd managed to maroon them in the past. She would always smile at him in her beautiful way and wait for him to get them out of it.

She _trusted _him...

Suddenly there was a commotion outside. With a devilish grin, Lilly raced out onto the landing, laughing openly at the commotion as Ron's yell of "RIGHT!" caused Mrs Black's portrait to wake up and start screaming. Somehow, she made herself heard over the din.

"Hello, _dad!_"

* * *

**_A.N: No song cameo! Well, there had to be some...I've nicked a line off of Lucian (the first Underworld movie) for Voldemort just cos it's one of the best for this kind of thing, and a line off Rose and the Doctor from_ The Impossible Planet _(Series 2). Also, the paragraph before Malfoy's dialogue is an excerpt from J.K.R's first chapter of OotP in case you missed that bit (just putting everything into a time context). More reviews, my lovelies! _**


	7. Welcome To The Jungle

**Chapter Six**

_**Welcome to the Jungle**_

_She's loving this, _Ted thought wryly as he got up and lurched onto the landing, running a hand through his tousled hair. Lilly was quaking with laughter as the skinny lad who was her father – his god-father and the best man he knew – looked up at her in absolute bewilderment. The scene below was bedlam as those in the advance guard whipped around in confusion. Sirius' laughter rang over the wall of noise as Ron rounded on Harry, his shouting drowned out by the portrait. Twin cracks announced Fred and George's arrival and Ted had to flatten himself against the wall as Hermione charged past.

Smiling suddenly, he pushed himself upright and stepped gently to the banisters where Lilly was doubling over. Her hair flashed in an instant over her pale face, a curtain of sparkling fire in the lamplight. It was amazing, really. Her mirth seemed always to light up the world and make even the bleakest situations bearable. More than bearable. It was _her_ adventure, her stage, but more than that. When she smiled, she gave everyone else that delight too, inviting him to believe for a moment that everything would be okay. This was _her_ mischief, and she _glowed _with it, until everything else glowed too.

She was _glorious _with it.

That was when Ted caught himself staring and looked away, smile slipping a little as he fought the image down.

_Beautiful…_

_Unbearable._

He sighed and wrapped his arms around her shoulders, jutting his neck so that he could look over the top of her head. She squirmed indignantly.

"Oi! Lurch!" She wriggled out of his grasp.

"And who do you think you are, the queen of Sheba?" He smiled lightly, compartmentalising everything behind his exasperated grin. "Have some pity."

She rolled her eyes as he moved past her, schooling his emotions until they were cool and clear. Mad-eye gave him an aggressive glare as he joined Sirius and his parents in shutting everyone up. Mr and Mrs Weasley tried to help by clearing the assembled aurors off into the kitchen, but they all stared at him as they passed. Some looked a bit puzzled, others shocked, and he suddenly registered that there were more there than he would have expected. As they managed to get the curtain shut over Mrs Black, his dad – _the thought still felt surreal_ – leaned over to him.

"Dumbledore assembled them after Mad-eye brought back Snape." He said quietly. "You feeling alright?"

Ted nodded, the action making him abruptly aware of the buzzing persisting in his skull.

"Yeah," he leaned a bit against the wall. Remus' eyes contracted as they fell over the side of his face, worry coming so naturally to him Ted wondered how he had not seen that look all his life. The deep pain he had felt before made him really fancy crawling back into bed, but he dragged himself back to the present.

_The past._

He realised he'd sagged against the wall when a hand fell softly against his shoulder.

"Theodore?"

Ted snorted, straightening.

"Look, just give me a cup of tea and I'm all yours."

"We'll make sure they put a strong pot on." Tonks added with a nod and a smile. Then she met Remus' eye and suddenly blushed, retreating into the kitchen. Remus sighed. The two of them suddenly became aware of the babbling conversation behind them.

"Oh, Harry!"

"Oi!" Ron poked him in the chest. "_My sister!_"

"_What _–"

"_My SISTER!"_

"Ron, what –"

"You're in for a long night mate." Fred said sympathetically.

"She's YOUR sister too!"

"No need to hang him over it!" George said grandly. "She's turned out quite well!"

"Thank you!" Lilly bounded down the stairs, still with a smile that could grow meadows, and put an arm around the furiously blushing Ginny. Harry opened and closed his mouth like a goldfish until Sirius took pity and rescued him.

"Sirius." He mumbled, attention averted as he threw his arms around his god-father. Remus smiled at the two of them and then glanced back at Ted. Ted returned the look with his own which was slightly lost.

"This is really very weird." He said slowly, voice a bit off-key.

"You're just realising this now?" Lilly called over, smile turned to a wicked grin. Suddenly something stirred behind the curtains and he joined his father in shushing them down.

"Not here." Remus turned to Sirius more gravely. "We need to join the meeting."

Sirius' pleasure at seeing Harry again faltered a little.

"Right." He muttered, mirror eyes flicking to Ted's. "Feeling better?"

"I thought I'd skipped the interrogation bit." He said heavily. His father grimaced.

"It won't be that bad, though I can't imagine there won't be questions." Remus tightened his hand. "You just need to give them your story, and then we can discuss what to do."

Ted looked up and caught a curious glance from Harry. He had to repress the absurdity he felt at the look of a confused teenager, only managing it by knowing Lilly must have felt worse.

"Shall we?" Sirius turned briefly to Harry and whispered something that Ted with his sensitive hearing heard as '_I'll see you later_' before gesturing to the kitchen. Ted nodded, expecting a veritable storm to break about him being allowed to sit in. But the look on Lilly's face somehow told him they'd already had that argument. Harry was the only one who protested, making to follow them only to have Remus shake his head, but he didn't push the issue. With his father's hand still on his shoulder, they stepped through to the kitchen.

* * *

"So, yeah, that was Ted." Lilly supplied brightly.

"Lupin's son!" Hermione was barely able to contain her excitement.

"_What?!_" Harry looked at the closed door as if expecting it to sprout legs and walk away.

"Never mind that, what about the dementors?" Ginny said quickly.

The mood fell like a stone weight.

"Let's get upstairs." Ron muttered. Lilly sighed, meeting Harry's eyes that were as much a pair with hers as Ted's and Sirius'. She'd seen photographs of her dad in his school days, thought about it once or twice, but none of that remotely prepared her for seeing him in the flesh. He was skinny, had knobbly knees like Albus, a dropped gait like James and she could have sworn she had inherited those cheek-bones along with his irises. He gave a helpless noise somewhere between agreement and ought-right astonishment before following Ron.

They made it to the landing before Fred and George passed them to retrieve something from their room.

"In here." Hermione gestured. The door still had the serpent handle, Lilly noticed. Well, it was more artistic than the stuffed elf-heads, at least. She hitched the smile back onto her lips and sank onto a bed, ducking as something white streaked over her head with a flurry of wings.

"Hedwig!" Harry exclaimed affectionately. The owl chirped.

"Yeah, she was all around me earlier." Lilly said fondly. "I think she missed you."

"In between pecking us half to death, anyway." Ron muttered. Suddenly Harry's expression hardened. Now _that _was a look she was entirely familiar with; the bastard of solid granite and an active volcano. It was a look she associated with James looking guiltily at his feet, or Ted gazing weakly at the cindered remnants of the shed.

"Well you'd think _this_'d be important enough to tell me." He said off-handedly in a tone Lilly knew as the preluding tremors.

"What?" Ron looked utterly confused for a second. "Oh, right – this…kinda just happened this morning."

"Still in the room." Lilly said a little irritably. Harry raised his eyebrows and nodded, breathing laboured.

"This morning. Right."

"Oh, Harry!"

Hermione seemed suddenly to come back to herself and flung at her father who looked momentarily taken aback. Ginny edged over to her and sat down as Hermione started gabbling about the attack and the lack of news and Dumbledore's communication blanket – '_oh, you must hate us!_' – finishing at last with the hearing and laws involving underage magic.

"Some things never change!" She whispered. Ginny grinned in spite of herself.

"Give him room to breathe, Hermione!" Ron said, pulling her away to stop Harry's imminent suffocation and causing the girls to giggle. Harry eyed Lilly as he crossed the room, Hedwig still on his arm. For a moment it looked like he was about to defuse, but a glance back at the four of them dashed that thought. Lilly braced herself for the explosion. The opening notes of a certain Guns 'n' Roses songplayed somewhere in the back of her head as she watched Harry turn away from them.

"So, Dumbledore made you swear. Any idea why he's so keen on keeping me in the dark?"

"Look, we wanted to tell you mate –"

"Couldn't have wanted to _that _much, could you."

"Harry –"

"I mean, you lot all holed up here together," He turned back to them from the other end of the room, his expression like nothing Lilly had ever seen before. "Must have been having a right laugh…"

"_No!_ Honest –"

"We would have told you, but he didn't want you to know anything!" Hermione said breathlessly.

_Boom, _Lilly thought humourlessly as Harry's face contorted.

"SO HE THINKS I CAN'T TAKE CARE OF MYSELF?" He roared, anguish and fury pouring off of him in waves. "I'VE BEEN STUCK AT THE DURSLEYS' FOR A FUCKING MONTH AND I'VE HANDLED MORE THAN YOU TWO'VE EVER MANAGED! AND DUMBLEDORE KNOWS IT – WHO SAVED THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE? WHO GOT RID OF RIDDLE?"

Lilly stared at him in shock. He had never talked like that, ever. Over the years, they'd pieced together the trio's adventures from one story or another, but Lilly had never heard her father speak so openly about them, much less shout them to the next street. She listened in awe as he poured every ounce of bitterness and frustration at his two best friends, resisting the urge to cower out of the way.

"OH, BUT WHY SHOULD I KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON? WHY SHOULD ANYONE BOTHER TO TELL _ME_ WHAT'S BEEN HAPPENING?"

"Harry –"

"JUST AS LONG AS I _STAY PUT _AND _STAY OUT OF TROUBLE_, AND THEN WHEN YOU NEED ME –"

"That's bolocks dad, and you know it."

Harry stopped in his tracks. Lilly fixed him with a look sharp enough to impale a pin cushion and bit back her astonishment. She also thanked god he wasn't her _grown-up _dad who would have just gone on at her for swearing.

"No one's doubting what you've been through, but what else could they have done, for fuck's sake?" She rose from the bed and stood between him and the others. "You've got that blood protection thing, so you _had_ to stay for a month."

"Blood protection?"

"Yeah, you didn't explain it very well, but it's like why Voldemort –" the rest of the room winced. "– couldn't touch you."

"BECAUSE THAT'S STILL WORKING _PERFECTLY_ SINCE HE STOLE MY BLOOD –"

"And still protects you if you're around Great-Aunt Petunia!" Lilly finished imploringly. "That accepted, they couldn't just have owls sending you this that and the other about everyone's movements, could they?"

Harry went quiet.

"I get that it must have been frustrating, but you can't just fly off the bleeding handle at your _best friends_ for something they couldn't control!"

Ron, Hermione and Ginny gave her a look that plainly said 'wow'. There was a pause.

"So you're my daughter?"

"Yeah."

Lilly flashed him a smile. The quiet descended like a sheet as Harry looked her over properly. She felt a little uncomfortable at that look, but it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be. He didn't look at her like she was a stranger and, as the anger receded, his eyes were curious rather than suspicious. She met them again. Suddenly the silence split with two loud cracks. Everyone jumped.

"You don't want to bottle up your anger like that, Harry." Fred shook his head, materialising at his right shoulder.

"Let it all out!" George added from his left. "There might be a couple of people fifty miles away who didn't hear you."

Both twins gave her a look of the deepest respect, making her blush worse than her mother. Harry sighed, seeming to have emptied himself out.

"How…?" He asked weakly.

"I…nicked Ted's time turner and there was a bit of an, um, accident."

"Ted…Lupin?"

"We're not going to get very far if you keep repeating everything, Harry." George grinned. He turned to his twin.

"Do you think we can get the extendable ears down there?"

"After Padfoot and Moony caught us?"

"It's worth a try…"

"What are 'extendable ears'?"

"They caught you?" Ginny sighed exasperatedly. "Well, unless Sirius is feeling particularly sympathetic…"

"They'll probably have perturbed the door."

"I wish I knew what was going on in there!" Lilly said suddenly, unable to keep the worry out of her voice. "It's not fair! I mean, Ted's not even properly of age and he's swanning off to face the whole Order of the Phoenix!"

"What _is_ the Order?"

The conversation fell to bringing Harry up to speed and Lilly found herself marvelling at the dynamic of it. She wondered if this was what historians would feel like if they could time travel. Her mind inevitably wondered, though, and she caught Fred eyeing her from across the room.

Uncle Fred who was on the shield for those that died…

She derailed that train of thought before it got anywhere. Still, it was unnerving to know exactly how and when the young man sat on the opposite bed was going to die. Her heart clenched suddenly for Ted with both his parents dead in the same battle. Would he tell them? Would he try to warn them? The questions rattled round her head until they hurt, prompting George to give her a worried look.

Surely they could do _something_…

She stood and cracked the door open, peering listlessly into the gloom.

"I'm sure he's okay." Ginny said gently behind her.

"You said he had Harry's nerve." George said accusingly.

"And you already stepped in for him." Fred reminded her. She scoffed.

"He looks like a sodding panda, Fred." She snapped. "And they're not exactly being gentle when it comes to us being a security risk."

"They already went through you." Hermione said earnestly.

"Yeah," Lilly sighed.

* * *

"_Why do you think they were there?"_

"_I don't know."_

"_There's no way they could have known _you _were there?"_

"_There shouldn't have been. I put in radiation shielding and magnetic dampeners over the main mechanisms, but I don't know quite honestly. I mean, there could have been something that tipped them off…"_

"_Did they know who you were?"_

"_Mad-eye, please, this isn't –"_

"_This could be important, Remus!"_

_Pause._

"_You said you talked to Malfoy."_

"_It wasn't an especially enlightening conversation."_

_Sigh._

"_What is it?"_

"_Just something Malfoy said…"_

* * *

The murmur of voices lifted up to the landing, causing everyone to go silent. Lilly bolted to her feet and leapt silently through the door, landing lithely by the railing and peering down. She pressed a finger to her lips as Fred and George joined her, silently praying Ron would get the message as well. With a wink, Fred handed her a length of the flesh-coloured string concealed about his person and together they lowered it down. The voices came into sharper focus.

"So, I suppose that's that." Arthur Weasley sounded resigned.

"Oh, I wouldn't give up hope." Remus said lightly. "We've had harder missions than a simple search and retrieve."

"Unless Voldemort has taken an interest…"

"Oh, you're as bad as Mad-eye, Sirius!" Tonks chided him. From their vantage at the top of the stairs, they just about saw Remus turn a smile to her before she blushed again.

"Blimey, she's worse than Ginny!"

"You'd wonder how they ever ended up with Ted!"

Lilly supressed a laugh.

"He's merely being a realist." A greasy voice followed. Lilly frowned.

"And what would you know about being a realist?" Sirius snarled.

"Snape." George mouthed in response to her silent question. "You don't know Snape?"

"Oh, this must be very cosy for you, isn't it Lupin? Finally, a full-fledged family?"

"It's more than you can say." Lilly muttered darkly. She was slightly shocked at the man whom her father had said was one of the bravest he'd ever met.

_My little brother's named after _him_?_

"Oh, I'd have thought you of all people would appreciate young love?" Ted said quietly. Even they saw Snape tense. It was worse than when he'd first caught sight of her and looked as if he was having a stroke.

"_What did you say?_"

"Nothing." They heard the shrug in his voice. Snape's heavy breathing caused the ear to crackle with static as he stalked away.

"What the _hell _was that about?" Fred breathed next to her. Sirius mirrored his question.

"I'm not exactly young." Remus said suddenly, something indiscernible lacing his voice as Ted shook his head.

"Thought you'd have been tired of pissing off death eaters." Sirius said dryly.

"It's a hobby."

The dark-haired man let out a bark of laughter that drowned out Mrs Weasley's indignant protest against Snape as a death eater. With unspoken agreement, the group wound up the extendable ear and made their way down the stairs. Lilly jumped the last few and danced over to hug Ted who was looking a bit paler than he had done.

"So," she said, giving him her best doe-eyes and sweetest voice. "What's happening, then?"

"If you're fishing for information, you're going to be disappointed." He raised his eyes at Sirius. "It's not like I'm _not_ going to tell you what's going on with us, but _they_ refused to talk about anything _else_ in front of me."

"You told Dumbledore you already knew a lot!" Tonks protested from the kitchen doorway.

"Not everything." Ted shrugged again. "It's not like Harry went into it in excruciating detail, I just know a couple of important bits."

"Dumbledore was here!" Harry exclaimed.

"'course he was." Sirius turned to his god-son exasperatedly. "This is the most interesting thing that's happened all summer."

"And he knew he'd have to help sort things out." Remus said wearily.

"What do you mean?"

She resisted the urge to parrot back the phrase 'search and retrieve'.

"Let's…talk about this over food, shall we." Ted gestured inside the kitchen. "I'm starving."

Lilly nodded, sensing something grim about the way Ted's brow furrowed together. They all filed inside to the sight of her uncle Charlie clearing everything off of the table before splitting up to help. Mundungus Fletcher introduced himself amidst Mrs Weasley's scolding for Harry being attacked on his watch.

"Well, if it isn't the ghost of Christmas past herself!" He cried, hoarse with shock.

"Well, you didn't faint," Sirius said from the cupboards. "Old Snivellus nearly wet himself."

"Oh, aye, well – she don't half look like her!"

"Thanks." Lilly said softly. It was nice sometimes. "So, what _is _happening?" She asked pointedly once everyone had sat down – and Ted had yanked the knife out of the table.

"_YOU DON'T HAVE TO WHIP YOUR WANDS OUT FOR EVERY TINY LITTLE THING!"_

"_Sorry, mum."_

"Ted?"

Close too, Lilly thought he looked much older than he ought to have done. As if, somehow, he had aged a decade while she wasn't looking. He took a deep breath before answering, his eyes all-too dull.

"Like I said: we're stuck."

"How stuck?"

"Not permanently, we'll make sure of that." Remus reassured her. "But it is going to take some time to get the time turner back and to send you home."

"How long?" Ron asked nervously.

"That depends how quickly we can operate to retrieve it." Sirius said gravely. "At least…a couple of months."

"Alright," Lilly nodded, swallowing heavily. "We can do a couple of months here, no prob."

Ted and Remus exchanged glances.

"What?"

"Well, I also said about mucking up the timelines. They're not static you know." Ted ran a hand through his hair so it stood on end. "We've just got to hope we haven't changed too much already. And if we have any hope of returning to the future we know, we're going to _have_ to stay out of major events."

There was a dead look in his eyes. Lilly couldn't help shaking her head slightly.

"But, Ted –"

"No buts! We can't afford to take the risk even with something small."

"But, what about –"

"We can't!" His voice was ragged around the edges and he shut his eyes for a moment to try and collect himself. "We don't even know if we'll be here long enough anyway. But if we try something like that then there's no point even attempting to go back, assuming we don't just pop out of existence."

Hermione nodded solemnly.

"It's true. That's why there are laws governing the improper use of time turners."

Lilly's jaw dropped. _How could he be being so impartial about this? _She felt anger boil up from somewhere in her stomach and gave him a look intermediary to horror and disgust. Why in that moment she cared about it so much, she didn't know, but it writhed like black flames through her gut. Just the knowledge that he wasn't even going to _consider_ the possibility made her skin crawl.

_You were uncertain before, _a small voice reminded her.

It was the rational thing to do. The cold, logical solution that meant Ted could fix everything like he fixed his ridiculous machines. But even the machines were not divested of his love and care, making it all the more incredible he was managing it in the face of _saving _people.

"But…" her voice was repulsively weak. "How…"

The rest of the table stared at her as she found the words. Her eyes burned with fury and a sudden spilling over of passionate upset – and she still didn't know _why_. Ted met her gaze without flinching, but she could see his eyes crumpling inwardly at the look on her face. The aging seemed to accelerate beyond all reason, and for a moment she was looking into the eyes of an old man. _Filled with regret_, came into her head from somewhere. But it wasn't just regret there as the words were torn from her mouth. There was something else…

"How can you just sit there and refuse to do a fucking thing to change what happens?"

"Because I have to take you home!"

* * *

It's the little things that bring the big things screaming forward. It had been decided in the meeting after a brief exchange with Dumbledore – after he had pointed out that, of the things he knew, he knew who died. He had agreed they should stay out of trouble. Out of the fighting. They would have protection for as long as they needed, and then they would go home. When it was done, Ted had felt the finality on the decision settle in his gut.

And it had cost him.

_He looked up at his dad – his dad whom he had effectively just condemned with his mum and a couple of other people whose names he recognised. His eyes ghosted over Snape._

_Two years to live. Just two years…_

_And then there was everyone else; killed or missing in the time in between. He shuddered involuntarily as he realised he was sitting in a room full of the dead. His gaze fell on Sirius, and his stomach felt like it had a nail being driven through it._

_Dead before the end of the school year. Ten months, give or take. Jesus…_

_He caught himself before anyone looked too closely at him and forced himself to think clearly. Or something like. Not clearly, then. Just about something else; _anything_ else. _

_So he thought of Lilly. _

Her gaze when she looked at him – how could he have stood that? She was the only reason he could live with that decision and the only reason it had been made in the first place.

_Because he lo –_

The entire table was staring at him. His voice had sounded so unlike his own, yet it had held all the anguish and supressed pain that _was_ him. Lilly stopped dead at his words and her look pierced him. For a moment, he thought she could see right into his soul. He was naked before her, the best and worst laid bare. It was like being in the forest all over again.

_Can she see…?_

"My priority is to get you home safe, not play god." He tried to ignore her wide eyes. "Believe it or not."

The kitchen was so still, he could have sworn he heard the dust falling.

"Quite right!" Mrs Weasley nodded abruptly. "An excellent plan."

Ted could have cried out in relief as the tension broke.

"As much as I hate the idea of leaving be, Molly's right." Mrs Weasley looked astounded as Sirius spoke. Lilly sank into her chair as he looked sympathetically over at her. "You two are the priority."

"Thank you." Ted said quietly. Lilly snapped her attention back to him, but to his unspeakable relief, the look of disgust and pinning perception had vanished. She looked painfully disappointed, but that wasn't unfounded. He, too, had been entertaining notions of being a hero ever since they'd learned of their location; he had just recognised them for what they were. Dreams. And childish ones at that. This was real – the real world – and _here_, you didn't charge in and bend history to your will because then everything would _be alright_. In the real world, you made the _sane_ decision.

"Now," he said, dragging himself back with a hook. "Can we talk about something else?"

The rest of dinner passed in a flurry of good food and quiet small-talk. No-one pressed further about anything, even Lilly, which surprised Ted a bit. She didn't usually back down. But a look at Fred and George's faded grins suddenly gave him the idea that maybe this was important enough to defer to reason.

_Imagine that, _he thought ironically, _Lilly Luna _actually_ listening_ _to me. Never thought I'd see the day…_

He just hoped he hadn't revealed too much with his little outburst. They were almost finished before he worked up the nerve to shoot her a proper glance, catching his eyes on Fred's as he looked quickly away. Both he and George raised an eyebrow. George tried to gauge where he'd been looking whilst Fred just stared as if he was an anamorphic puzzle. Fighting a blush with difficulty, Ted returned clearing up his plate. The twins were still giving him odd looks, but before he could say anything, Sirius made the motions of someone about to speak. He leaned back in his chair and sighed so that the rest of the table looked up.

"That was very good, Mrs Weasley." Ted said in the sudden quiet. The red-haired woman whom he'd known as 'grandma' since before he could talk beamed.

"Well, thank you very much! It's so nice to have what I do _appreciated _every now and again."

The Weasley children all rolled their eyes, but Ted was just relieved Fred and George were now looking elsewhere. Sirius raised his eyebrows, but Remus elbowed him before he could comment. Tonks looked like she was on the verge of giggling.

"You've certainly been brought up good and proper!"

Ted couldn't help sparing a look for Harry, who met it with slight confusion. It was only a fleeting moment, but Ted suddenly wished _his_ Harry was there to shoot him back a reassuring look. _This _Harry looked suddenly uneasy and glanced away. Lilly noticed and caught his eye.

"Well indeed, Molly!" Remus said with exaggerated pride. Sirius suppressed a snort.

_Don't say anything. It'll be okay. Don't. Say. Anything._

Somehow, they'd both managed to avoid the subject and told a litany of both their lives minusing the _pointed_ details. They'd told of adventures and near misses and Lilly had taken the wheel with the rest since everyone wanted to know about the next generation. In short, through it all, they'd steered away from the 'you died' like a port of plague rats. Lilly flicked her eyes away before he realised he'd been staring.

The afterimage burned.

"So," Sirius shifted to try and bring them back to his original point. "Harry."

The table fell silent again.

"I'm surprised at you. I thought the first thing you'd do when you got here would be to start asking questions about Voldemort."

The air went frigid. Ted groaned slightly, though a grin tugged up the corners of his mouth.

"Talk about subtle as a flying brick." He mouthed to his father.

"I did! Well I started shouting, anyway, and then Lilly sort of…talked me down." Harry said awkwardly. Lilly grinned as the adults turned to look at her incredulously.

"Blimey," Tonks said, awestruck. Harry let out a noise of indignation and Sirius took pity, laughing slightly. Suddenly Mrs Weasley leapt in with her arguments about them being too young to know anything and they descended into shouting. Ted rolled his eyes again as Remus tried to referee her and Sirius while the rest tried to make themselves heard.

"Well, it's not much to us seeing how we already know." Lilly cut in. Mrs Weasley glared at her.

"And do you realise how much danger that puts you in?"

"Only if she shoots her mouth off!" Ron objected exasperatedly.

"And do you think that will stop them?!" Mrs Weasley all but shrieked. Sirius counted her fiercely and chaos resumed. Suddenly, tired and having lost the thread of the various arguments, Ted stood and jabbed his wand at the air above the centre of the table. There was a resounding _BANG_ as the spark he had ignited there burst into sound. Everyone looked at him. Not for the first time, he was rather glad he'd gotten so tall.

"Is everyone finished?" He asked calmly, but there was a under note of anger that rarely appeared in his voice. Lilly snapped her head round in surprise.

"Oh, all _authoritarian_." She said sarcastically.

"Lil!"

She fell silent at the look he gave her. Sirius frowned, breathing a hard. Both his parents looked surprised, and suddenly he felt the agitation that had driven him ebbing away. He rolled his wand back into his sleeve with a deft flick and stuffed his hands into his pockets, shoulders rolling naturally forward. He had to physically resist the urge to kick his feet.

"I was just going to say that it might be best for us all to get a proper idea about what we need to know so we're not all coming at it blind." He said gently into the stunned silence. "That way we can at least work together to –"

"You're not of age!"

"No, but that doesn't make me any less responsible for taking care of Lilly." He turned to look straight at his father. Remus sighed.

"Remus –"

"You are not the only one here who cares for them." He said evenly, but only a fool would have missed his words' ferocity. Sirius gave him a weak smile. "And you can't stop Fred and George, Molly. They're of age." The twins looked triumphant.

"_And,_" he continued carefully with a long look towards Sirius and Tonks. "I think Harry deserves to know the truth. Some of it anyway."

Mrs Weasley gasped and Sirius looked deeply grateful. Perhaps it was Ted's imagination, but it seemed his parents' eyes lingered together the longest and that his mother gave Remus an uncertain smile. Then the moment was gone as Sirius leant past Mrs Weasley to look at Harry directly. Suddenly Mr Weasley, who'd barely spoken at all, said quickly "We can't tell you everything, mind."

"We shouldn't be saying anything at all!"

"But this is at least better than a garbled version from…other sources." Remus pointed out calmly. Fred and George exchanged a look.

"And isn't it better that they know enough to keep them out of trouble?" Mr Weasley offered, looking imploringly at his wife. She caved with a noise like an angry cat.

"FINE!" She then tried to order everyone else out of the kitchen, but was cut short by Lilly's adamant statement that they would all know anyway, one way or another. Red in the face, Grandma Weasley finally sank into her chair and let Tonks pat her sympathetically on the back. Ted sat down as well as Remus pulled him gently into a seat.

"What was that spell?" He asked under his breath.

"Miniaturised version of a blasting curse?" Ted smiled faintly. "Only, I modified it a bit so all the sound waves go subsonic."

Remus shook his head slightly as Sirius leaned forward once more. For a second, Ted thought he might have overstepped some invisible line and all the little insecurities started shooting forward. But the hand at his elbow gave it a little squeeze and he realised his dad was more impressed than disapproving.

_My dad's impressed with me, _he thought absently. _Amazing._

"OK Harry," Sirius said clearly. "What do you want to know?"

* * *

Ted listened carefully, but got the distinct impression the twins, Ginny, Lilly and the trio had already discerned much of it. He watched his parents through most of it – his mother doing her best not to stare at the pair of them as Sirius and Remus did most of the talking. They both sounded weary, though, his father looking a bit dishevelled. He'd looked like that in the meeting too. Ted supressed a sigh when he considered the toll being in the fight was taking on all of them. Lilly had been right when she'd called the Order "_the Balls and Bayonets Brigade_" at the start of the discussion. Sirius had laughed, but there remained something grimly true.

And something clicked in both Sirius' and his father's eyes when she smiled.

_Must be hard for them to remember, _he thought suddenly. He hadn't really considered it hugely, but now he did it made sense for it to hurt. After all, they'd lost people before, just as they were about to lose people now –

_Don't. _

He clamped down on the thought before it went anywhere and wrenched himself back.

"But if Voldemort's trying to recruit more Death Eaters it's bound to get out that he's come back, isn't it?" Harry was saying. Ted raised his eyebrows as Sirius growled slightly.

"Voldemort doesn't march up to people's houses and bang on their front doors, Harry. He tricks, jinxes and blackmails them. He's well-practised at operating in secret. In any case, gathering followers is only one thing he's interested in. He's got other plans too, plans he can put into operation very quietly indeed, and he's concentrating on those for the moment."

Lilly sat up in her seat and Ted's mind flew fleetingly to a conversation he'd once had with his own god-father.

"_The thing about Voldemort was that no one knew exactly what he was doing until stuff happened. You couldn't predict him because he was always the sort of wizard who had things going on in the background, invisible until he wanted them to be. And you couldn't always be sure why. That's why keeping him in the dark and being one up on him was so important."_

"What's he after apart from followers?"

"Stuff he can only get by stealth. Like a weapon. Something he didn't have last time" Sirius looked grim. Suddenly Lilly jumped up in her seat.

"Oh, you mean the proph –"

Ted moved so fast his hand was a blur. Mrs Weasley cried out as he grabbed Lilly's wrist, effectively yanking her over the table.

"Ouch! _Ted!_"

"You know?" Sirius yelped, suddenly alarmed.

"Of course we know! It falls under 'important bits'." Ted said, breathing heavily and giving Lilly a very hard look. "Actually, we probably know more than you about it."

Lilly pulled her wrist free with a returning glare, but kept her mouth mercifully shut.

"Do the death eaters know you're aware of all this?" Tonks asked, face white.

"I didn't exactly take the time to point it out, no." Ted eased back into his seat. "And I don't think it was something Malfoy really considered while he was torturing me on the floor."

The kitchen fell quiet as Ted gave an involuntary wince and looked away.

"Well," Lilly said pointedly, though her voice shook a bit. "Uncle Ron's right about it being fine unless we send out a flyer. We just need to be careful."

_Says the girl who just nearly let slip one of the most important pieces of information about the war, _Ted thought stingingly, but he didn't say it.

"I think that might be enough." Remus looked at his son with a sudden intensity. "Sirius?"

He nodded, still shocked, and surrendered without protest.

"Oh, now he says enough!" Mrs Weasley found her voice. "You might as well induct them into the order forthwith!"

"Well, why not!" Lilly said suddenly with the same passion as before. "We could at least be of some help!"

"No."

Everyone looked round at Sirius as he beat Remus to it.

"No," he said more quietly, and there was something else in his voice as he looked across at Lilly. "Other than the damage you'd risk to your own futures, the dangers involved…you can have no idea, any of you." He added, shifting his gaze to Harry. "You're too young."

"What about –"

"The Order comprises wizards who've left school, Fred." Remus said firmly. "Sirius is right, you're too young."

"So what do we do then?" Lilly asked slowly.

"Dumbledore's agreed that we should stay here for the time being and then see what we should do next as and when." Ted passed a hand over his eyes. He felt almost ashamed that he had not joined the rest in protesting their fate, but he couldn't help thinking about their encounter with the death eaters. The part of him that had always tried to live up to everyone shouted that he should have offered himself, but a much larger part shrunk away. He felt defeated.

He never wanted to experience that again. The terror, the desperation – the horrifying thought that it might all be futile, that he might have failed everyone. And that was by far the worst bit. He never wanted to go back, and he was all but certain he would be no use to anyone if he did.

_Coward._

Mrs Weasley was talking logistics and the twins were grinning, but all of a sudden he found the same waves of weariness taking him. His father said something about going to bed, and the rest acquiesced, filing out the kitchen door, followed by Mr and Mrs Weasley. Sirius hadn't moved. Both Lilly and Mrs Weasley had to be pulled along to get them out of the room, but finally it was just him, his mum and dad, and Sirius.

"Are you alright, Ted?"

"It's okay, I'll be fine." He muttered, trying not to sink too obviously into the warmth of his father's hand on his shoulder again.

"You've got your hands full with that one." Tonks said, imitating brightness. Ted chuckled.

"Oh, you have no idea."

His mother smiled genuinely at him, and Sirius finally looked up.

"You're a good lad." He said thickly. "Protecting her like a bloody wolf."

"That's not funny." But his lips twitched up anyway. Remus grinned, but he felt another assault of the tiredness and it must have shown because suddenly he was being helped up and out of the kitchen. He said goodnight and climbed the stairs with Tonks whilst Remus stayed behind with Sirius. She didn't say much, and he got the feeling she was as overwhelmed as he had been earlier.

"I just…can't believe it!" She said outside the twins' door.

"Me neither." He admitted, and she embraced him tightly. She didn't quite relax into it, but smiled widely when she pulled away. He watched her until she disappeared from view on one of the floors above. Suddenly, with his sensitive ears, he could hear music from beneath his feet. Lilly. She always found a way to play a song if she had it stuck in her head at the end of the day – most days in fact. He stood there for a moment to try and figure out what it was.

'_Welcome to the jungle, it gets worse here every day…'_

He chuckled hollowly. They got the 'jungle' bit right.

* * *

"_You know, Sirius, I was taken aback before."_

"_Is it really so surprising?" Sirius swallowed heavily. "I just got this image in my head of Lilly standing up and telling us all to keep fighting."_

_Remus came to his friend's side._

"_I miss them." The dark-haired man said very quietly._

"_I know."_

* * *

"Eh, Ted!"

"We'd like a word if you please!"

Ted ambled inside. He could still hear the music in the room below.

"What's with you and Lilly?"

"_What?_"

* * *

**_A.N: Firstly, the song (that I don't own) is Welcome to the Jungle by Guns 'n' roses because I loved the whole sense of it. And sorry for the wait! What I've tried to do is integrate JK's dialogue into the whole thing - somewhere between just re-writing it (which is annoying cos it's BORING) and sticking reams of my own stuff in. Just hope I hit the right balance! There are a bunch of quote bunnies in the dialogue too - "an old man, filled with regret" is from Inception, "You're just realising this now?" I got from BBC Sherlock (Moriarty's response to Sherlock saying "You're insane") and there are a couple of others I think. I used Ripley's line (from Aliens) "I am not going back there and I wouldn't be any use to you if I did." And poor Ted - how long can 'non interference' last, honestly? Still love your reviews: they're what motivate me more than anything else!_**


	8. Our House

**Chapter Seven**

_**Our House**_

The tiredness evaporated like water, replaced by panic.

"You and Lilly."

"There is no 'me and Lilly,'" Ted spluttered indignantly. "She's my god-sister. She's family!"

"Really?"

"I know not what tongues you speak." He raised his chin loftily, regaining composure. The twins exchanged a look and then looked back at him with identical blank stares, completely unconvinced.

"Bolocks."

"Yep."

"What do you want me to say?" He tried to keep his voice at a level of cool nonchalance while the blood pumped in his ears.

"That we can trust you with our niece."

"And that you –"

"There's nothing going on!" Ted's voice raised more than he thought. Suddenly the very walls seemed oppressive, and he dropped onto the camp bed the twins had set up, head in his hands. Dominic had tried to broach this conversation, but he was as willing to have it now as when he'd told his best mate to shove it. He sensed the twins looking at each other before feet shifted uncomfortably.

"You really…"

"…don't…"

"…do you?"

Ted raised his head.

"Don't what?"

"But –"

"What about the looks?"

Ted was on his feet again and pacing to the door and back.

"George, there's really nothing – nothing that _could_ ever be going on." He stopped at the foot of Fred's bed. "Do you think she noticed?"

He had to ask. He didn't meet their eyes.

"That you could barely keep your eyes off her?"

"Or the particular fashion your eyes looked when you thought no one was watching?"

Fred shook his head and George sighed.

"Oh, Teddy."

They both sat down on either side of him, a hand on his shoulders consolingly.

"Do you think she noticed?" He repeated more insistently. George looked ever more sympathetic, but Fred loosed a small chuckle.

"Well, if she's as oblivious as Harry and Gin, you should be fine."

Ted let out a long breath and collapsed back into the wall.

* * *

"So, you do _know_ what all the fuss is?" Ginny asked casually. Lilly shifted around under the covers to face her across the room in the dim light. A lorry thundered down the road a few streets away, and suddenly she missed the peaceful quiet of the country nights. You could hear birds out there – real owls – and you could see the stars if you looked out the window. Maybe Ted had a point wanting to get them home...

"I can't tell you." She said quietly. Hermione made an approving noise while Ginny sighed.

"He said 'you'."

"What?"

"He said 'I need to get _you _home.'"

"What are you trying to say?"

"I dunno." The young girl turned away to lie on her back with Lilly still staring at her. "Night, Lil."

"Night, _Mum._"

Hermione giggled.

* * *

_Lilly dreamt that she was back in the forest, dancing the waltz with the man who looked like, but who most definitely wasn't, Ted. Their skin was shining silver in the moonlight and his amber-green eyes gleamed, beautiful and terrible. She struggled back, and he caught her again. She was about to scream, but then she was bent fluidly back like in the old movies and he was whispering in her ear._

"_I could never harm something so lovely."_

_He drew slowly back. His lips were a hairsbreadth from hers…_

* * *

"Hey, Lilly!"

Someone was shouting at her door. It sounded like her uncle Ron, but how was that –

"You'd better get down to breakfast before Ted runs out of eggs!"

_Oh. _Everything rushed back.

"Whas Ted doing with eggs?" She groaned through a sleepy fog.

"Breakfast!" Ron called happily. "Only you'd better be quick!"

Lilly let out another groan and collapsed back into her pillow. She was so tired…and she wanted to crawl back into the dream. What was it with her that these things kept going on inside her head? She'd always thought of Ted as…Ted, really. There were boys, and there were girls, and then there was Ted. The difference being that, on the whole, Ted remained more or less the same whilst everyone else changed. Maybe it had something to do with knowing him so well. Or that he remained immovably _there_.

_He said 'you.'_

She shook the words from her head. They were ludicrous. But harder to shake was the image of his lips so close to hers, or the feeling of his breath on her skin. Shouldn't that have terrified her more? Those eyes: they were wild, savage, governed by laws that she couldn't begin to comprehend. And yet, she couldn't help being enthralled by them.

Slowly she sank back down, that look…those eyes…burning behind her own – until the smells from the kitchen finally wafted up. In a toss-up between a Ted fantasy and Ted's full cooked breakfast, there was no fair competition. Falling out of bed, yanking on Ginny's borrowed pyjama bottoms and wrenching open the door, she sprinted down the stairs.

The kitchen was full of people, but Lilly was hardly surprised. Ted had obviously volunteered to cook and it had quickly become clear that he was a master with food. Mrs Weasley was the only one watching him with anything less than eager wonder as the rest tucked into eggs bacon with French toast. Yawning hugely, she dodged everyone to get to Ted and wrapped her arms round his middle as he stood at the hob.

"Morning, Ted."

She missed Fred and George's stifled laughs as Ted stiffened in surprise and narrowly avoided dropping the pan.

"Hey, Lilly." He sighed resignedly. "I suppose you want some of my famous eggs, then?"

"I've never had better eggs in my life!" Sirius called appreciatively from the table. Mrs Weasley sighed gently.

"Don't feel too bad, he did get it from you." Lilly said as she released the master chef and went to sit down. Well, her _and _Fleur, but she didn't say that bit. Mrs Weasley perked up somewhat and Ginny and Harry tried to hide their snorts with overloaded forkfuls. Then they noticed, and everyone else laughed at their sudden statuesque postures. Tonks patted Harry on the back in mock-sympathy – until Sirius caught her eye with a look that said '_and you're improvement on this is…?' _She blushed desperately and was only rescued when Remus came in and told Sirius to stop tormenting her.

The eggs were _stunning._

"Right, well we can't sit here chatting all day. Tonks, you've got work to go to, and we've got a doxy infestation in the drawing room that isn't taking care of itself." Mrs Weasley rose with a business-like air.

"Wasn't that the room everyone was in before?"

"They're in the curtains at the far end. Everything else is just a bit dirty, that's all."

"And full of my parents old memorabilia." Sirius said with distaste. "I'm glad we're finally getting shot of all that rubbish."

"There isn't anything you'd think of keeping?" Remus asked quietly.

"No. Not a thing." He aimed a glower at his last pieces of toast. "I don't want anything of theirs. Or anything that reminds me of this place. It can all burn for all I care."

The whole kitchen fell quiet for a moment, but Remus nodded sadly and didn't push him. After a while, they all started filtering out, most to meet up in the drawing room. Tonks and Remus went into the hall together since both needed to leave and Lilly, Sirius, Fred, George, Ted and Ginny were treated to the sight of Ted's parents sharing one, quiet moment, before Tonks had to conceal a fit of giggles by ducking out the door. Remus shot them a look of exasperation, clearly miffed the scene had been observed. Ted looked politely contrite, but Sirius and Lilly just gave him a big thumbs-up.

"They'll come round." Sirius said confidently as Remus left on Order business and they met up with the others.

"They're not the only ones."

Lilly had to laugh at her father as he spent the rest of the day trying not to gawp at Ginny. Finally, Ron ended up hitting him over the head with a book on genealogies he'd found under the sofa. She and Ted had somehow been recruited into the 'eradication' party, but it was weirdly enjoyable. It gave them both a chance to get to know everyone better and to have sporadical discussions about what they were going to do. Everyone pitched in, though it often just dissolved into talking about other things. Half-way through the morning, Ted went upstairs and found a wireless with Fred and George's directions.

"Genius, Ted is." She sighed to Hermione as he found _I Don't Like Mondays _and turned up the volume.

"_Muggle music?_"

"Don't knock it 'till you've tried it!" She called with a manic grin, singing along with the radio. She caught Ted's eye and he grinned back, murmuring '_I just wanna sho-oo-oot the whole day down_' under his breath. By the time Mrs Weasley called for lunch, she'd managed to get him to do it properly and she was pretty sure they'd converted everyone, not least because they could both sing. Ted denied that _he _could, of course, but even the twins said it. She was bouncing around like a loony, she knew, but honestly couldn't bring herself to care. It was too brilliant.

The morning was capped off with Mundungus' and his stolen cauldrons.

"I love hearing Mum shouting at someone else," Fred told her with a satisfied twitch of the door to let the noise circulate better. "It makes such a nice change."

"I know what you mean." Lilly muttered. She made the smallest shrug towards Ginny and a shudder, and the twins had to bite their laughs.

"So," George waggled his eyebrows conspiratorially.

"What?"

"There's you and James, but you're only the _grandchildren_ of a marauder."

"Not that you don't carry the legacy _exceptionally –_"

"– but we were wondering," Fred jerked his head pointedly in Ted's direction. Lilly grinned.

"Oh, he might act all good and proper, but might I assure you that under that prim, upright exterior," George snorted. "He's just as much of a mischievous bastard as the rest of us."

"Is that right?"

Lilly spun around to Ted who was suddenly standing casually behind them, eyebrows slightly raised.

"Well, it's true!" She cried indignantly at his face split into smug smile.

_How does he always manage to sneak up on me?_

Her eyes flicked to the scar settled between his jaw and ear, answering herself with an internal roll of her eyes. Sometimes she genuinely forgot, or it wasn't something she immediately thought of. Either way, it wasn't _that _comfortable to be reminded that he could sneak up on her as well as she could sneak up on him. There was a rustle behind her.

"The new ones, Kreatcher doesn't know. More brats and blood-traitors, and the brats of blood-traitors, no doubt. Oh, my poor mistress! Fouling up the house with their filth! What would she say? But master said he was the brat of the half-breed and the freak – the idea! And that _she_ was –"

"Hello, Kreatcher."

The house elf started and gave Fred and George an unconvincing bow before muttering to himself once more. Lilly heard many crazed – and insulting – things from his deep, croaking voice, though he mostly seemed to be trying to inch around the room, eyes darting here and there. She shot the twins a questioning look and they both sighed in exasperation. Hermione was pitying and tried to talk to him, but he just looked affronted and muttered – very audibly – about mudbloods in his mistress' house.

"Mum and dad got through to him at some point." She mouthed to George as they watched in distaste. Of course she herself didn't remember him as such. He'd died when she and James were very small, but she had a feeling Ted remembered him, if only a little. He had an eyebrow raised and looked almost sad.

"Keeping your mistress' house then, Kreatcher?" He asked politely. Kreatcher gave a great bow and muttered a great stream of mania about werewolves, freaks, mudbloods, blood-traitors and –

"How in the name of _Merlin _did they do it?"

"Something to do with Sirius' brother." Lilly shrugged. "He's buried under mum's rose garden."

"What do you want, Kreacher?" George asked loudly, repressing a shudder.

"Kreacher is cleaning."

The elf turned back, muttered something incomprehensible, and Ted sighed in understanding.

"He's after the tapestry." He said dully as Sirius reappeared. The black-haired man snorted derisively and kicked the elf out, much to Hermione's dismay. Suddenly Ted gave an odd sort of twitch as she watched, covering it quickly with a flex of his fingers.

"Ted?"

"What?"

He was smiling, but beneath it, like a mirror subtly changed, he was…anxious. She could tell. Something had happened and it was doing a good job of bothering him. He turned away from her too quickly and stood quietly by the family tree as everyone else milled around the sofa.

She missed the twin's conspiratorial look behind her.

As she thought about it more, though, the more she was startled at how calm he had been so far. He oughtn't have been, but he was good at that – being calm. But this went beyond, and Lilly had the distinct feeling he was bottling all the stress he was under. He was good at that too, not that any good ever came of it.

It could have been from seeing Kreatcher again, but the wretched-looking elf hadn't exactly inspired worry, had he?

_No, that didn't make sense._

At least she was safe in the knowledge that he would eventually tell her, in his own time.

He always did.

* * *

"Harry?"

"What is it, Ted?"

_Don't panic. Don't panic._

"What day is it?"

"Err…" Harry looked unsure as he suddenly appeared to notice Ted clutching his right hand. "Saturday. Why?"

"Do you have a –"

He was cut off by Sirius joining them by the tapestry. Ted sighed as another wave of anxiety hit him, followed by a veritable bombardment of information. He could have identified every living being in the house by its smell; could hear the other's heartbeats in the pattern of their breathing. As Sirius began to talk, he was thoroughly distracted by the _taste _of magic in the air. He could even discern between those spells cast by the house's current occupants and those that hung in shrouds around the cabinets.

This last item brought with it such an instinctive revulsion he nearly gaged.

"Was he killed by an Auror?"

Ted frowned as he pulled his mind back to the conversation.

"Oh, no, he was murdered by Voldemort. Or on Voldemort's orders, more likely; I doubt Regulus was ever important enough to be killed by Voldemort in person."

_Regulus..._

"From what I found out after he died, he got in so far, then panicked about what he was being asked to do and tried to back out. Well, you don't just hand in your resignation to Voldemort. It's a lifetime of service or death."

_R.A.B. _

"He wasn't that much of an idiot." He said suddenly. Both his companions gave him a startled look, Sirius' laced with sudden intensity that he clearly tried to bite back and hide as soon as it appeared. Ted couldn't take his eyes off of the face next to the burn mark – more because he remembered Harry staring at it than because he understood properly. Harry had shown him an old note and explained that Kreatcher's locket had been Regulus', but hadn't wanted to say anymore. Kreatcher had told him Regulus was a hero. His god-father seemed to pity him.

Sirius was about to question him when Mrs Weasley arrived back with sandwiches and called them for lunch. He didn't feel remotely hungry – on the contrary, he felt as if his stomach had been slowly cramping up. The aches in his joints had started an hour before, the heightened senses a little before that. He winced involuntarily and turned away before Sirius could get the words out to ask, moving towards the door. Lilly's eyes followed him. He gave her a reassuring smile he didn't feel. Harry held back Sirius for a bit longer, and he did his best to hide everything as everyone else chatted contentedly.

He heard little over the screaming of his receptors.

But it made it easier to concentrate on Lilly as she laughed, nearly glowing – he hadn't seen her so happy since the summer. She was too…he tried not to think 'pretty', but got stuck on the word…too _good_.

_No, not good either.._.

His thoughts jumbled.

_She's happy. That's all it has to be. She's glorious – beautiful, amazing, incomparable, the one, SHUT UP! – because she's happy._

He as much wanted to take that away from her as he fancied hacking off his own limb. He continued smiling, talking, and even ate a bit, but all the while the knowledge sank further in. _He _would tarnish her happiness eventually. It was in his nature. He was still a walking nightmare, still a –

_You're not a monster, Ted._

"I just need to pop to the loo," he said as casually as he could, walking as slowly as possible out the door and slumping against the wall, knees crumpling. The words reverberated and reached around his brain like a lifeline, but they did nothing to ease his desire to crawl into a hole somewhere far away. Far enough away so she wouldn't be hurt.

_Again._

"Are you alright, Ted?"

He jumped.

"I'm fine." He mumbled, trying to block off his misery, but Sirius grabbed his shoulder and forced him round so he could look Ted in the face.

"Ted, I've been best friends with a werewolf most of my life." The storm eyes studied him closely. "When was the last time for you?"

Ted sighed heavily.

"The day before yesterday."

Sirius blanched and swore.

"I don't know why I didn't think of it earlier," Ted gave a hollow smile. "Must have slipped my mind."

"Do you know…?"

"I can feel it."

The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them, but even as he spoke he could feel the wolf stirring in his mind. Sirius dropped his head and breathed heavily. He looked back up at Ted before muttering "Oh, bloody hell."

They'd skipped over the more unpleasant details of his condition, but they had at least covered Ted's being 'unusual'. And that the wolfsbane potions were completely useless. The rest of the conversation had driven the subject from their minds, though, as he and Lilly had reminisced about their good memories. Ted hadn't even stopped to consider how hard the next change was going to be now he was no longer taking anything. And _none_ of them had thought that it might be so soon now they were in the past.

"Right," Sirius tried to shake himself into thinking clearly. "I'll check the calendar, but from what Moony says it's early next week, so you've got a couple of days at least."

Ted nodded, sinking into the wall.

"You sure the potions don't work?"

"Be too late now if they did."

They shared a moment of grim silence as laughter filtered through the drawing room door.

"Do you mind if I use the wine cellar?"

"No, not at all." Sirius paused before saying "I'm not entirely sure what's been living in it, but we can get it clear in time, no problem."

"I wouldn't worry too much."

Sirius raised an eyebrow.

"I doubt doxies would attack an irate werewolf."

Sirius let out a bark of laughter and Ted grinned. With an unspoken agreement to keep the others blissfully ignorant, they re-joined the cleaning party. He'd have to tell Lilly – if she hadn't already figured it out. If she had everyone else would know, but nothing else was said and no one asked, which was fine with him.

He did find his dad, though.

His reaction was one of surprise when he turned up for dinner and Ted took him into the now empty drawing room.

"I thought you knew." He said faintly, looking at his child with a mixture of concern and pity.

"I didn't think to check."

"Oh, Ted."

Remus sighed and hugged him.

"Are you going to be okay?"

"Yeah," Ted tried to smile, but it didn't quite work properly. "I mean, it won't be the most pleasant experience, but…" he shrugged. Remus just held him tighter and shook his head.

* * *

_Tuesday._

Lilly had checked the calendar in the girls' room.

_It was going to be Tuesday. Fuck._

Ginny asked her what she was looking so worried about. She wished _her _Ginny had been there. It was selfish, but was needing your mother selfish? And she wished she could talk to her dad, but this Harry had enough on his mind without piling Ted's problems on it. Still, this Ginny was as much her mum as Mrs Weasley was her grandma. It was just…different, that's all. Different, but the same as well.

"He's been having a hard time of it at full moons. And, see, back in the future he's only just come out of one."

Hermione put her hands over her mouth.

"That's awful!"

"It's fucking awful. No one should have to go through that."

"Is there anything we can do?"

Ginny looked helplessly at the wall as if she could see Ted's sleeping figure through the woodwork.

"We don't mention it." Lilly said firmly. Hermione was about to protest, but the red-head silenced her. "No! He's so private about it nowadays. It hurts him, Hermione, and it's _so_ personal to him."

She frowned out the window into the deepening night.

"Ted's got into dealing with this on his own, and he'll do that come what may."

"But we have to be able to do something!"

"We…be there for him?" Lilly mirrored her mother's hopelessness. "Fuck, I dunno. But he'll tell us if he needs something. And I'll bet Sirius knows."

"Why's that?"

"Because if I notice werewolf ticks, he does too. He's got Moony, remember?"

There was a _crack_ in the semi-darkness and Ginny yelped.

"Sorry, little sister!"

"You landed on my knees!"

"Yeah, well, it's harder in the dark!"

"It would have taken you twenty more seconds to walk." Hermione sighed exasperatedly. George ignored her and sauntered to the window to join Lilly.

"Anything interesting?"

"There're two cats doing it behind next door's bins." She pointed.

"_Eww_."

Ginny nonetheless joined the rest of the room in crowding for a look.

"I suppose it's the season for animal love."

"Must be, Fred."

Lilly frowned at them as they exchanged knowing grins.

"What _are _you on about?"

Fred studied her for a moment before chuckling to himself and shaking his head. Giving up, she looked back out the window and sighed.

"Ted's under stress, then." George said casually. Rolling her eyes, she turned and marched to her bed. She lay down neatly among the covers, and then spoke.

"It's his business. Back off."

* * *

The days blurred. They were enjoyable, particularly the afternoon his mother joined them scouring out the parlour, but the feeling of being stalked by a wolf-shaped shadow never left. It stayed with him; in the background, behind his eyes, in his dreams. Dreams were the worst. Without the wolfsbane, they had the exquisite clarity of cut glass and he saw terrible things. He _did _terrible things, and it was Monday he awoke screaming to George shaking him at three in the morning. He didn't go back to sleep after that.

_Strands and strands of red hair, beautiful as burnished gold, each laid fluttering on the cracked ground, the blood rushing past in little, curving rivulets…_

Food was like lumpy, spongy dust, but drinking tea was okay. It helped calm him, though he knew nothing would in the end. Remus joined him at five. His father was pale as well, if not as pale. They didn't talk, but his father being there – his quiet way of caring that didn't need words – was enough. The fire crackled illuminating the scar patterns on both of them like white brands, making them move as if they were still being made. Remus asked him eventually about his hand, but Ted's throat stuck. The wolf had burst through the day before, gone quick as smoke, but everyone had seen it.

And no one had said a word.

But, though Ted wanted nothing more than their understanding, he couldn't speak. Remus frowned sadly, and took the hand into his own, holding it without another word.

Sirius joined them at around seven and insisted they both ate something. He tried and failed to broach the subject before everyone else came in, though by that time Ted was feeling marginally better. He offered to make scotch pancakes, though his hands were shaking and he kept dropping things. Their soft laughter and shared delight more than made up for the discomfort, though. He caught Lilly's eye and her gleaming smile seemed to light up the day. They were laughing and joking more than usual, he quickly realised, but he couldn't care less in the end as he watched Lilly being genuinely happy.

It would almost be a pity to leave.

Parting with the family they had discovered had never really occurred to him, but suddenly it hit him with an unpleasant crash. For one, childish moment it seemed so blisteringly _unfair_ that they had to leave. To give up the joy they had found together; it seemed like a cruel joke – dangling it in front of them like a donkey and a carrot to make them dance.

Though, perhaps it wasn't so unexpected…

Remus stayed at his side all day.

When night began to fall, he felt like the skies were collapsing on him.

* * *

"You shouldn't have problems now we've evicted the ghoul."

"Oh, Teddy!"

"Mind you, that ghoul _was_ bonkers enough to try and crawl back, with or without a werewolf…"

"Oh, Teddy, dear!"

"_Mum!_ You don't have to _cry_!"

"Don't be ridiculous, Ronnie!"

"Err…mum, I think you're suffocating him…"

"Molly,"

Remus gently prised Mrs Weasley from his son, but couldn't resist gathering Ted up himself.

"You're sure there's nothing else?"

"Fred," Ted sighed heavily as his father let go. "George, thank you. But this is about as much as you can do, I'm afraid."

"I'll come and see to you in the morning."

"You sure, Sirius?"

"Absolutely. I am very much experienced in dealing with this sort of thing."

"If you give my son firewhiskey, Sirius, I will put a permanent sticking charm on Kreatcher and stick him to you!"

"You wouldn't!"

Tonks squeezed tightly as Sirius gave a theatrical shudder.

"We've got a few minutes until moonrise." Remus checked his watch, face grey.

"We'd all better, um," Mrs Weasley looked slightly lost. "Leave you to it then."

He nodded and she started shepherding everyone out of the kitchen, blowing heavily into her handkerchief.

"You'll be fine. It always ends, remember that. However hard it seems, however far gone you feel, it _will pass._" Remus looked like he wanted to say something else for a moment, but changed his mind and hugged him tightly. "I'll see you in the morning."

"Yeah. Yeah, in the morning."

Ted screwed his eyes shut against his father's shoulder and Remus did not let go. His mother's hand traced his back and then enfolded him from behind.

"Time to go."

She took Remus by the elbow, forgetting her shyness in an instant, and then they were gone. He would transform in the attic. A vast, cold void opened inside him at their absence, but it had no rational place in his head as he hefted the bag over his shoulder. Sirius and Lilly, the only two left, followed him quickly to the wine cellar door before he turned to them.

"How strong is the wood?" He asked Sirius doubtfully.

"Strong enough to hold you, trust me." Sirius laughed, though it sounded wrong somehow. "My father had a thing for his wines. The number of times I tried and failed to break in here to get at them…" Anyone else would have smiled fondly, but neither teenager missed the wince.

"'spose they've all acidified, now."

"Still get a small fortune for them." Sirius said, genuinely grinning this time. "Though, that'd _hardly_ be more satisfying then pouring them all together and using them for cleaning. Would've given the old bastard a heart attack."

"Bet you wish you'd thought of that before!"

"Oh, if only, Lilly, if only!"

"Look," He tried to put the words together, but found nothing was connecting anymore as the two stared at him. They were like light – he could never say that to them, but their mirth and life was like a lifeline as the darkness closed in. Tingles were crawling all over his skin and his muscles were beginning to shake. The night was crystal clear, and he could almost feel the weight of the moon inching over the horizon.

He had to say something. Something profound. He wanted them to know how grateful he was, but nothing came and it was fear that surged up as he looked into Lilly's eyes that were like a forest pond.

_Her face contorted in terror; beautiful, monumental, quailing beneath him, yet what did it matter if she was anything _more_ than _blood _– _

His arms were wrapped around her without memory of having moved to put them there. He heard Sirius' sigh as he tried to reassure himself that she was alright, that she would always _be _alright. She held on just as fiercely and through his elbows he felt her shaking. Her scent overwhelmed him and he never wanted to let go – a thousand things ran through his mind. As if he was dying and this was the last time he would hold her, last chance he would ever have to –

_You are a sick bastard, you are NOT dying, and she deserves better than a screwed up, control-issue werewolf she considers her brother!_

She did think him her brother after all, didn't she?

"Lilly," the words crashed through his other thoughts and forced them to recede. "Lilly, I need you to go back upstairs."

"I'm not a fucking idiot, Ted." She breathed a chuckle. "Not much of a statement coming from me, but still, I'm not that stupid."

She pulled back enough to look him in the eye.

"Still not going anywhere though."

"_Lilly –_"

"I just mean I'm not going to abandon you. Know that."

"Lil, you…oh god."

Ted clutched at her face and brought his forehead down to hers, trying to fight the overwhelming wave of emotion that came at her words. His fingers ran through her hair, and for a moment, just a moment –

"I need to know you'll be okay." He blurted out thickly.

"I'll be here when you come out. That's a promise, Ted. I'm not going anywhere and I'm not leaving you alone."

"You're still adamant about that then." He tried to keep the relief from his voice as he laughed humourlessly. "Even though I'm –"

"When are you going to get it through your thick skull, Theodore!" She grabbed his hands and pulled them from her cheeks, a look of anger and defiance burning through her face. "You are not, nor will you ever be, a fucking monster! You're beautiful."

Ted's heart stopped. It took a moment for her to realise what she'd just said and she flushed ever so slightly, burying it instantly. Sirius opened his mouth, frowning in baffled disbelief, but no sound made it out.

"Well, he is!"

"When did you –"

"Long story."

Sirius looked somewhere between awed and terrified, but Lilly ignored him and threw her arms back around Ted, gripping him as tightly as he had gripped her.

"Most people would be traumatised." He said faintly. He looked up and met her eyes as she slowly shook her head, as though it was the most absurd notion in all the world.

"No."

Sirius stared at them, though Ted was barely aware of it. Half his brain was screaming at the other half whilst something else woke up in earnest and howled, but it was all transient. She was still staring at him, her expression gentle but unreadable. He could have spent years trying to understand her and still gotten nowhere. _Girls. _Girls were complicated – excessively. They had to articulate everything and expected every boy to be able to do the same because it was so obvious to them. They spent ages analysing whilst him and every other male on the planet just went with it.

Then there was Lilly who leapt in without a second thought and who took going with it to a new level entirely. She went with it, all the emotion of a girl on instinct, which was worse, if anything. What she really, truly thought was a secret all of her own.

Then he yelled, the pain hitting him like falling through a glass window. Lilly yelped and Sirius dived forward.

"Right, in you get."

"Sorry, I..."

"Don't worry, it's fine, in you go!"

Between them they managed to steer him through the door, both doing their obvious best not to panic. He felt as if he was being put through a crusher, resisting with all his might only to have his bones grind and splinter about muscles that writhed and skin that boiled. He lost track of which way was up or down, but he knew the door was still open. The need to plunge – to fall and submit – was so intense it fuelled his screams as Sirius and Lilly desperately disentangled themselves at the bottom of the stairs. He would die from the agony if he resisted now, the humming _thing _rising from the dark, but he couldn't. Not yet. _Not yet!_

"Ted!"

"GO!"

The humming was getting stronger, filling his blood and his head with something _feed_. Something that was unchained at last and whose sheer force of anger and exhilaration he was powerless to stop. The aggression bloomed with terrifying swiftness, and he could feel himself _stretching…_

"LILLY, COME ON!"

They were going, _they were going, _they were almost gone, and then he could let go…

"Ted…"

His eyes snapped open, humming and hurting in even the dimmest light, yet those…_softest _of sounds. He remembered them. Everything else was turning to a nebulous grey and black mass, but not her. Not the glorious creature that was Lilly. She wasn't just beautiful, but soft and gentle like the adamant, even as she burned like the fire in her hair. The wolf stopped at the word that was _his_ name and Ted spoke finally what was worrying him so much about the girl who was _more._

"Don't listen."

Then he was gone.

* * *

She was half blinded by tears by the time she shot over the threshold, Sirius sealing the door behind her. Screams erupted behind them, the like of which both had heard before, but that didn't make it any easier. She was barely aware of Sirius holding her as she cried, the harsh rise and fall of his chest catching the water as she wept.

Then there was a roaring howl that was enough to turn her blood to ice and something hit the door with a force like a battering ram. Sirius tensed his arms around her, but the door held. Slowly, Lilly released him and reached to touch the wood that separated them from the blood curdling shrieks and enraged growls. The door was hit again before Sirius pulled her away, taking her into the kitchen where the sounds could be heard no more.

Her hand trembled as it gripped her mug.

"I'll put the radio on."

Sirius got up and set the wireless on the table. Lilly reached for it automatically, though her hand felt like it belonged to someone else. Skipping through the frequencies, the dial landed on something she recognised and she tuned it in.

'_Our house, in the middle of our street, our house…'_

She swiped at the tear-tracks on her cheeks even as new ones replaced them. Sirius looked white as a sheet and grim as the house.

'…_such a very good time, such a fine time, such a happy time…'_

"He'll be alright."

"I know."

"Lilly…"

He looked almost embarrassed about something. She stared at him through her crying, bewildered as to what could have crossed his mind. But as she did so, he seemed to lose his nerve and looked down, shaking his head.

"Oh, it's nothing, forget it."

"What?"

"It's not important."

* * *

**_A.N: I Don't Like Mondays is by the Boomtown Rats, I think, and Our House is by Madness. I just love the irony of the second one being used in the context of Grimmauld place. A lot of the bands I use are British since they are my parents and my native childhood artists and wholy appropriate here, but I'm also trying to use good ones. As in classic or well known. So, there will be a Queen song in there. Trust me. And Coldplay. _**

**_Also, as you may have guessed, this is pretty much following the book round to a letter, but I'm trying to get the balance with not re-writing it. I suspect that will get easier when they get to Hogwarts - did you think they wouldn't? HA HA HAHA! - since a lot of emphasis will be on the experience of a seventh year with Fred and George. Also, this is about Lil and Ted and their stories will come through a lot - like Ted's transformations. I'm just fascinated by the mentality of the two of them - the manic depressive discovering who he really is and the firecracker slowly understanding what it is to grow up. But enough of that, whaddaya think? Drop us a review, my lovelies, drop us another beautiful review!_**


	9. I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)

_Okay, REALLY not sure about this chapter. I've tried to wrap everything up whilst offering a bit more character development, but I think it just drags in the end. Not sure how to sort it as yet... _

**Chapter Eight**

_**I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)**_

He lay on the floor. Everywhere hurt.

What began to bring him round in the end was the sense of someone gently shaking him. He'd somehow managed to crawl under the blanket and curled himself into the foetal position, but he didn't quite have a memory of it. He thought fleetingly that this must be what it was like to wake from being blind drunk. The shaking continued. He phased in and out of awareness, noticing that it was accompanied by a voice now. He couldn't make out the words though, much less identify who it was, so he stayed stubbornly comatose until he could collect his wits.

The irony was that he was feeling much better than he would have expected. Oh, his _body _felt absolutely terrible – as if he'd been beaten over and over again with wooden mallets – but his head felt much clearer than the last change. He didn't feel like the world was tripping, or that he was dying from some tropical fever. He tried to move a little, and let out an involuntary groan, bringing the words into focus.

"Your father's upstairs – expect he's asleep by now – and Lilly insisted on staying up."

"Sirius?"

The man leaning over him gave him a small smile.

"Yes, it's me. Can you move?"

"After a fashion. Maybe."

He twitched over to try and support himself on his hands, but couldn't manage it. Sirius sighed, frowning, and crouched down to pull Ted's arm around his shoulder. Everything from his skin to his muscles protested, however, and before they'd even gotten upright, pain seared across his arm and back. A gasp ripped out of his chest.

"What's wrong?" Sirius asked urgently, but Ted just collapsed back, working his other hand to wrap the blanket properly around his waist. At least he could get up with his modesty intact, but his right shoulder throbbed horribly. Sirius stared intently at him for a moment before his eyes fell to the offending injury. He winced.

"Ah, Ted…"

"What have I done?"

"It's swollen, right round to your shoulder blade." Sirius' eyes were filled with sympathy. "Don't you remember?"

Ted sighed.

"It's a bit blurry. I think I smashed it into the door, but…"

He trailed off. Sirius crouched again and gently pulled his chin up to face him.

"It's okay, Ted."

"I barely remember for all the _anger_. It's like watching and remembering things through a red mist."

"It wasn't you."

"That just makes it worse."

Sirius stared at him in confusion.

"When I transform, it's like something wakes up, inside here." He dug a finger into his temple. "Something else takes over. But it's still all my…my fears and frustrations…" he struggled for the words. "…all bits of me it's built on. Only now it's grown into something else, something wild and alien I haven't got a hope of controlling even though I feel it every day. Every time I reach to change, even if it's something small, I feel it _lying_ there. Beneath my skin."

He looked away in self-pitying disgust.

"Have you talked to anyone else about this?"

"No. Dom tried to get me to, but I…" he shook his head. "And…the thing with my hand…"

"Ted, listen to me." Sirius took his head in both hands. "I told Remus many years ago, and now I'm telling you: you are _not_ a monster."

"That's what Lilly keeps saying."

"Well, she's right! And whatever this is, you don't have to go through it alone. We'll find a way through it, understand?"

Ted nodded glumly.

"Now, let's just get us a nice cup of tea and see to your arm."

"Okay."

Sirius moved around to his other side to help him to his feet.

"You know what really scares me?" He asked quietly. Sirius was concentrating on getting them up the stairs, but glanced around and shook his head.

"I'm a shape-shifter, right? It's like the wolf-skin's already there, fully formed inside me. All the time. Waiting to burst out – and not just my hands."

Sirius stopped by the door and turned to face him.

"I get nightmares about it sometimes. I'm afraid that one day…I'll forget how to change back."

* * *

Lilly gulped down – _what was it? _She went through and mentally counted. She was gulping down the last dregs of her…_ninth_ cup of tea. In total. _Fuck._ She wondered if giving up on sleeping and coming back to the kitchen only to find Sirius still up and then having nine cups of tea watching the dawn made her just a little a bit mental.

She finished the tea with this thought. Then decided she didn't care.

The whole thing was mental when you thought about it.

"Lilly, can you check the potion cabinet for muscle relaxant? Fire seed salve, red cover."

"Already got it out."

She pushed the tin down the table as she got up. Ted sighed, easing into a chair with Sirius' help. The new cuts and bruises snaked over his skin like some obscene pattern, the only mercy of which being that he hadn't disturbed the yellowish remnants of his head injury. He looked about ready to drop dead.

"How're you feeling?"

"Not great. I can see properly, though, which is good."

"Probably 'cos you weren't fucking poisoning yourself."

"Lil!" He groaned as Sirius wordlessly applied the salve. "I still have a headache, you know!"

"I maintain swearing's good for you." She shrugged. "Tea?"

"I might still vomit."

"You would have done that already." Sirius pointed out dryly, working his thumbs through the injury. "Trust me, you'll feel better."

Lilly fetched the pot and added a third mug before pouring one for each of them. She was trying not to think of her thumbs in place of Sirius' – trying to stay the guilt that they _should _have been her thumbs. Ted had his eyes lightly shut and she had the detached feeling that he was perfectly fine without her for the minute. Repressing a tor of confused hurt, she flipped her mind to something else.

"It's dad's trial today, isn't it?"

Sirius set the tin down, face grim.

"He gets off, I take it?"

"You sound almost disappointed."

"_He gets off?_"

"'Course he does." Lilly slid him the second mug's handle. "What he did was perfectly legal, did no lasting damage and was the result of gross ministry negligence, what more do you want?"

The ragged man dropped into the chair next to Ted and glared into his tea.

"It's not wrong to want to spend more time with Harry." Ted said suddenly, though Lilly noticed him sinking down in his chair as the pain left his face.

"Are you saying I _wanted_ him to be convicted?"

"Is it so unthinkable? And it is cruel that you don't see him very often."

"I wouldn't take away his whole life just to have him here with me, what do you take me for?"

"Someone who loves him? I didn't say it was a rational thing to want, but doesn't make the reality less cruel."

Lilly silently sipped her tenth cuppa and tried not to feel too uncomfortable. Her attention drifted round the kitchen as Sirius' absent reply bore down, the conversation unnerving her more than she hopefully showed. The two men sat in the heavy quiet for a time while she examined the spices on the rack near the hob. Ted's eyelids were fluttering by the time she got back to them, and she felt like going to him, but for some reason she was unsure.

She'd _never _been unsure, but there it was.

Half the night she'd gone over the scene in front of the door.

_Remembered falling asleep in the hospital wing having wrapped him in her arms._

At the time, both had been because he needed her – and, she was forced to admit, because a part of _her_ needed _him –_ but in the cold light of the morning it was if a barrier had been thrown up.

Sirius took another ten minutes to notice.

"You need to get some sleep, Ted."

"Can't argue there."

Lilly sighed and tried not to slump over the table.

"I'm sorry I caused so much trouble." Ted mumbled suddenly. "Keep screwing up, lately."

"Bolocks."

Sirius set the mug down with a thump.

"And it's no trouble to me."

"Thanks."

* * *

Mrs Weasley cried a lot. It was overkill, really, but the sombre undertone that preceded Harry going to the ministry was palpable all over the house. Harry himself barely spoke to anyone and all the Order members who came to visit looked grim. Lilly had to remind herself not to prowl around the house shouting _'of COURSE he's not going to be convicted!'_, and ended up confining herself to Buckbeak's room instead. The hippogriff looked keenly at her as she fed him dead rats and stroked his feathers – as if he knew something wasn't quite right – but he made no move to harm her, so she promptly settled herself against his flank and dozed off.

Sirius joined her as the sun was setting.

"You're really good with him." He commented as she started awake. "Not that he isn't the trusting type."

"I've been around animals since I was six years old, both tame and otherwise. And Ted, of course." She shifted luxuriously, nuzzling into the space beneath the wing joint. "When I was little he used to tell me stories of running through the woods in the full moon as if the world was new. I always thought it was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard."

Sirius let out a long breath and sat opposite her on the floor, frowning slightly.

"There's a lot of beauty in the world for those who are willing to see it." He looked out at the sky stained red. "But still more who would just destroy it without question or without really _looking_."

"That's what Fudge represents."

"What?"

Lilly shrugged sadly.

"He represents a failure to see what's really there. The ignorance of people too narrow minded to consider that there might be another way of looking at things." She closed her prickling eyes. "Sometimes I think humans set themselves up as so_ superior_ they can't see that all we are capable of doing is destroying. I mean…" she gestured vaguely. "…we destroy each other, we destroy anything weaker than us, we lash out at anything stronger because it scares us and we're so terrified of anything _different_ that it has to be stamped out without hesitation."

Sirius stared at her with his dark-grey eyes – different to Ted's she realised; more worn. It might have been the light, but she thought his eyes were shining just a little bit. She looked away to the light dancing on the floor and to the stardust in its wake. Suddenly Sirius laughed and she looked up to see him shaking his head.

"What?"

"You're right. About the monsters under the bed."

Lilly frowned.

"There was a wise woman, though," his voice was slightly choked as though his throat was constricting. "She said that as long as the world had someone to cry for it, there was hope for us."

"That's a nice thought."

"Yeah, it was."

He chuckled, sniffing and blinking hard. Lilly smiled and tried to imagine the woman he must surely have been quoting.

"I'll never be that wise."

"Oh, I don't know, give it a few years!"

"Well, err…" she wracked her brain for some _Zen_. "_They say the flower that blooms in adversity is the rarest and most beautiful of all._"

"Really? Where's that from?"

"Not telling."

_Ever. If he found out it was from a muggle Disney film, she'd never hear the end of it!_

Sirius seemed to consider what she said.

"I wonder,"

"What?"

"Well, I'm just wondering if you might be right."

"About a flower blooming in adversity?"

"Yes."

She gave him a long look.

"I doubt anyone will ever be caught accusing you of this again Sirius, but don't be so fucking pretentious!"

"_Me? Pretentious?_"

"My point exactly."

He scoffed and then laughed unrestrainedly. The sound permeated the settled shadows, and suddenly the old room didn't look as dingy as before. The light failed, but nothing seemed dark when Sirius laughed and pulled her gently to her feet. It was like when her father used to sit her on the veranda swing seat and read stories in the dusk. His voice was enough to drive out the rest of the world, though with Sirius it was something different entirely. The shadows of Azkaban had never left his face and they probably never would, yet when he laughed the joy of life poured from him and infected everything around him.

She hugged him. For a moment he seemed startled, but hugged her back with another ripple of laughter before nudging her out the door. They farewelled Buckbeak and started down the stairs.

"You never know, though."

"Oh? You're saying I might grow up to be 'rare' and 'beautiful'?"

"You _are _rare and beautiful."

"True." She shot him a haughty look. "Though I dunno about 'blooming in adversity'."

"We'll see."

* * *

"_So you have no leads?"_

"_We must be patient, Remus. Though it is little hope Lucius Malfoy has let it out of his sight."_

"_This is no more than what we expected, Professor, though I must say your optimism for getting the item back _at all_ is most _gratifying_."_

"_You could be a little more sensitive to the issue, Severus."_

_Sirius snorted._

"_I notice he is…absent."_

"_My son suffered the effects of having transformed twice in a short period. He is recovering."_

"_Oh? Perhaps it was premature of us to suppose him capable of –"_

"_He is capable!"_

"_Miss Tonks, kindly sit down! And Severus, please refrain commenting if you cannot say anything that is not untoward of the boy."_

"_He's not frail, if that's what you're implying."_

"_Bill?"_

"_And how would you know, Weasley?"_

"_I'd know, Snape, because of the way he goes about. And because of the scars. He's not weak, just a bit lacking in self-confidence. And you should hear Lilly talking about him. I don't think we've seen anything yet of what he's capable of, 'specially after he gave the death eaters the run around. Doubt he knows either."_

"_What do you mean?"_

"_Well, I suppose what I'm saying is we need to give him the chance to prove himself before we go off making judgements."_

"_Exactly, Mr Weasley. My thoughts precisely."_

"_But prove himself for what? We've already established he's not going to fight because it would destroy the timelines, and even if it wouldn't he's too young!"_

"_I'm not suggesting differently, Molly."_

"_They can't stay in this house forever."_

"_Why not, Mad-eye?"_

"_It's impractical."_

"_In what way? It's my house and I'm not ashamed to admit I'd be glad of the company! It's not as if I'd mind looking after them!"_

"_It's impractical because it compromises Order headquarters."_

"_It compromises headquarters having Harry here, but that doesn't –"_

"_Harry will not be staying here, Sirius. He _will_ be returning to Hogwarts for the new term."_

_There was a pause._

"_You're sure?"_

"_I have in mind a way to countermand Fudge's support. Unless he goes so far as an act of tyranny, he cannot pass conviction within the current laws."_

"_Wouldn't put it past him."_

"_Nevertheless, I will make sure that our Mr Potter will be quite alright. Which brings me back to Miss Potter and Mr Lupin. The reason I consider against prolonging their stay in your house, Sirius, is that I cannot protect them as I should like once Hogwarts is under my full care. I cannot abandon a thousand students for the lives of just two, unforgiving as it may be."_

"_Then what are we to do?"_

_Remus stared at Dumbledore as the old man raised a hand to his temple._

"_I have a notion, though it may prove troublesome for the future. Be that as it may, however, I don't believe it would cause irreparable damage if they were careful enough."_

"_Is this what we were discussing earlier, Professor?"_

"_Indeed it is, Minerva."_

"_I do not see a problem with it, though as you say they would have to be careful."_

"_A problem with what?"_

"_Helping them maintain their education whilst keeping them within the safety of my school. It is the most obvious solution."_

_A murmur went round the table, though most were wondering why they hadn't thought of it before. Sirius was trying not to look too disappointed and Remus seemed torn between relief and pity._

"_Now, we must discuss our strategy should tomorrow go awry."_

"_Lilly says it won't."_

"_And I would trust her word, Mr Black, but still I would rather we were prepared."_

"_I would take care of him, Professor. Without question. I'm his God-father."_

_Dumbledore closed his eyes for a fraction of a second. It was going to be a long night, and he found himself almost envious of the young werewolf asleep in bed._

* * *

Lying staring at the ceiling wasn't helping in the slightest. His thoughts still swirled around like a snowstorm and prevented him from sleeping, just as his muscles prevented him from moving. He was imprisoned, essentially, doomed to limbo and a blank ceiling.

_You nearly kissed her You nearly kissed her You nearly kissed her, _floated round and round his brain until he could have sworn it was making him dizzy. And the worst bit was that she hadn't batted an eyelid.

_Hang on – worst bit? It's like you WANTED her to react, to notice, you SICK –_

He just wanted time to sort things out. God knows he hadn't had it so far. He needed time away from her, yet he couldn't _bear_ to be away from her.

_You sick bastard…_

Not that it was even an option and he still needed to protect her.

_You nearly kissed her You nearly kissed her…_

He needed to anchor himself back to solid earth, get his head on straight, sort out his life – should he be writing this down? – get them home and snap the hell out of obsessing about her. Not that the last one would be easy since it hadn't worked already. Then again, he would be leaving home after this year, or at least in as much as he could manage, and that alone would help. He wouldn't see her practically every day and maybe then it would get easier. He'd be in the midst of experiencing new things too, new people, and thoughts of his god-sister would hopefully be stuck up on a shelf somewhere.

Not that he didn't love her to bits, but he just wanted _out._

_And you think it would be _easier_ if she were gone from your life?_

He stamped on those thoughts, but they were like venomous tentacular and writhed up anyway.

_You think you would not think of her?_

_You nearly kissed her You nearly kissed her You nearly kissed her..._

"_And why not? She is beautiful; she is ours."_

"_She's not ours, she's my god-sister!"_

"_She did not smell like our blood."_

"_That's not the point!"_

"_She was soft and beautiful and _ours_."_

"_She's not ours, she can never be ours…"_

"_She MUST be ours! She cannot be another's!"_

"_Fuck off, just fuck off, please!"_

_He whimpered as the man with green eyes and a wolf's grin growled and ran away into the forest, surely following her. He could not let that happen, could not let the monster take her. He was stumbling over the uneven floor, but his limbs were heavy, dragging him down. He shut his eyes, and suddenly he was looking out of the humming sockets of the other. He was burying his face in her hair that was wildfire in the woods, trailing his hands in places he knew were forbidden, but the wolf wouldn't stop. It dragged its lower lip over her earlobe and whispered, even as she gasped in fright._

"_Mine."_

"Ted?"

"What?"

He spun around in shock, tangling the sheets around his legs and pitching off the bed.

"You alright?"

"You look pale, mate."

"I'm fine." He said mechanically as George offered a hand. "It's not like I don't have anything to dream about."

The twins exchanged a look.

"You were, err –"

"– moaning a bit, there."

"Anything you want to tell us?"

"Don't be crude." He kept his voice calm before the irrational upsurge of panic and embarrassment. "What d'you want me for, anyway?"

"They want to see you in the kitchen."

"What time is it?"

"Nearly eight."

He tensed.

_Well bugger me._

"Lilly's right, you do do that!"

"Anyway, we thought you might want to see Harry off."

"Thanks." He pulled on the nearest shirt with a wince and stumbled out the door. Harry looked grey and he didn't seem to be able to eat anything, despite Ted offering pancakes. Mr Weasley looked grim, but seemed to be taking solace from Lilly's reassuring eye-rolling and exasperated grins.

_How beautiful she could look in the morning…_

He fought the mental flash of his dream and focussed on finding a way to sit that didn't make his bones scream. His father offered him sympathy with a cup of tea, but everyone else seemed too preoccupied to notice. Or so he thought until Lilly was suddenly at his side.

"You should run a bath. Does wonders when I've had cramp after quiddich."

"Yeah," he tried not to be distracted, but it was hard. "Might do that in a bit."

"Dumbledore wants to talk to you when he gets back."

At the other end of the table, Harry's frown deepened.

"Dunno what you're complaining about. He's gonna be at the trial."

"Really?"

"'Course he is. No get out there and show up the picks who dared to bring this up!"

Despite himself, Ted smirked. Harry looked taken aback, but marginally better as Mr and Mrs Weasley shepherded him out the door. Sirius gave Lilly a grateful smile and put an arm around her shoulders before disappearing into the depths of the house. It was subtle, but Ted could have sworn Lilly's presence had affected him more than anyone realised – as if she represented more than just a temporary addition to their little family. As if the memory of his best friend's wife was slowly drawing out the best in him.

The smile stayed, and he wondered vaguely what Sirius would do once they were gone. Harry had described him as being not very happy, fondly as he remembered him. He would still have his god-son, and that was something. But Ted knew in his heart that the memory of Lilly Evans and even the presence of just Lilly herself was different again. It was…like a challenge to do better.

The only challenge he had ever hoped to meet, brilliant mind or no.

_The only challenge he could never meet._

* * *

The morning passed about as fast as could have been expected. Harry got home in a state of elation, and everyone celebrated. Even Sirius, though whether it was a combination of his understanding smile or Lilly's persistent poke in the ribs, he never found out. Fred, George and Ginny dragged Lilly into their tribal dance round the kitchen to the chant of_ 'HE GOT OFF! HE GOT OFF! HE GOT OFF!'_ before being forcibly evicted by Mrs Weasley. Unfortunately, Sirius then joined them in the drawing room to continue, pulling Harry and Ron along with him. Ted laughed at Mrs Weasley's scandalised expression, and even more when he realised Hermione was looking almost wistful.

Remus arrived back from work for a few minutes at lunch to congratulate Harry, though he couldn't stay for long. Lilly pulled him haphazardly into the fray, much to everyone's delight (save his quiet-natured father's) and all in all no one wanted to break the mood. Even rescuing Remus turned up another round of laughs when Lilly insisted he take her place. His muscles were still hurting badly, but he braved it, tripping over his own feet as they whirled round the room a turn. Even through his pain, he marvelled at how natural this movement was for her; how she seemed to fly. When she released him, relieving as it was, he felt bereft, and then kicked himself for it.

_You nearly kissed her…_

"Are you alright, Ted?"

"Just a bit sore." He muttered, though he thought he must have let some of the bottled up emotion show on his face because Mr Weasley looked confused. Was everyone noticing now?

"We encountered Lucius Malfoy at the ministry." Mr Weasley tried to say it off-handedly, but it still cut the air like a knife.

_Well that's ONE way to stop thinking about something, certainly!_

"What did he say?"

"Nothing forthcoming. Not that you would have expected any different from him."

"I take it then that he didn't offer to return my magnum opus?"

Mr Weasley chuckled darkly.

"Not that I asked in front of Fudge."

Ted sighed and watched the others settle into a proper party atmosphere. It might have been his imagination, but he got the feeling it was Lilly who wasn't letting it go. She was always one for a party, and she'd had precious few things to really celebrate lately. He hated to think that that might have been because of him. _And now he was back on Lilly…_

Suddenly their eyes met from across the room and she flashed him a grin that was entirely her own. The grin that made his insides feel like they were on fire, and he smiled back, meeting her mirth with genuine glee and the stray, dangerous thought that the world would be alright.

* * *

"Mr Lupin, might I have a word?"

The music in the drawing room was loud enough that they'd had to cast a sound-proofing charm on the door to prevent Wulberga from waking up, but it was worth it for the sense of joy pervading the dark house. It seemed to transform everyone it touched, though none more than Harry and Sirius. Lilly chose the music, of course, and he'd had a hand in the food with Mrs Weasley. The twins had had a hand in decorating. There were even a fair few Order members who turned up, though no one would own up as to how the word got around.

No one really cared.

Each and every one of them felt the storm outside and it was enough to laugh and revel before braving it once more. His father had found him and put an arm around him as they watched Lilly challenging all the Weasleys to a furious tournament of gobstones, loudly supported on both sides by the rest of the room. He didn't say thank you, but it was in every gesture as they stood together. Then his mother hand emerged from the other side of the drawing room in a beautiful hot-pink dress and striped stockings, looking up from the game to catch their eyes.

Remus had gone a little slack-jawed and Tonks had blushed endearingly. Ted rolled his eyes and prodded his father to join her. Sirius gave him the thumbs up from where he stood craning over the game with Harry and he grinned when he noticed that Lilly was still winning after beating Bill, Fred and Weasley Senior. Now she was gearing to thrash Ron, who had the look of a man about to run up the white flag, with Mundungus gleefully preparing to call in the bets.

That was when he heard the soft voice behind him.

"Professor?"

"Might we go somewhere quieter?"

Dumbledore gestured gracefully around the crowded and noisy drawing room.

"Certainly."

They slipped quietly away, Ted fighting the butterflies that appeared in his stomach at the prospect of _Dumbledore _wanting to talk privately to _him. _They ended up in the comparatively deafening silence of the kitchen.

"It seems that between you, you've caused quite a stir. I don't think I've seen Sirius Black in such spirits since the deaths of James and Lilly."

Ted stared at him, temporarily lost for what to say. The brilliant eyes seemed for a moment focussed on something far away, a tinge of long-worn grief overlaying the usual twinkle. It passed quickly, though, as Dumbledore looked up, suddenly very present.

"I brought you in here so that we might discuss your academic grades."

"_What?_"

"Your grades and, I suppose more specifically, your OWL qualifications."

"Professor?" he had literally no idea where this was going, but obliged the old man's kind smile and did his best to remember accurately. Dumbledore questioned him quite thoroughly, about both him and Lilly, before seeming satisfied and getting to his feet. Ted narrowly escaped tangling his legs on the chair when he jumped up to open the door for him. With a last amused smile he left, bidding him good-night, and leaving him distinctly puzzled.

He told Sirius, who sighed heavily, but told him he would find out soon enough. They were interrupted when Lilly's last, triumphant victory over George rippled through the room.

* * *

The days, and then weeks, by-passed them in a blur with the lead up to the end of the holidays. They'd even gone shopping, with everyone pitching in, since it was impractical for the two of them to continuously borrow clothes. It was as if they had moved in to the lives of their past without realising it, and Ted had the nasty feeling that things would be changed now however careful they were. Though, as Remus pointed out when Ted voiced his concerns, it could hardly be change for the worst. Not when they'd brought life to everyone even in the short time they'd been there.

And, since there were no leads on the time turner, the situation was looking as if it was going to stay put for a while yet to come. A few months? He wondered if their future would be recognisable. If they had unwittingly altered the fabric of history like that old theory of a butterfly flapping its wings on the other side of the world.

Even the smallest things could change the course of the future; Harry's victory over Voldemort had proved that.

And it was _wrong – _he had to get them home. He had to get _her _home. He was _responsible _for her. He swung between enjoying himself and anxiously obsessing over what to do, sometimes many times in one day. Lilly had caught him brooding more than once and had shoved him out of Buckbeak's room the second time, refusing to let him be moody. Yet somehow he managed it, hiding from her in new places. Still, it wasn't as if he was morose all the time. The atmosphere since the party had stayed almost…family-ish. As if Grimmauld place was just any other home in that part of London.

Rather than the headquarters to the organisation saving the world.

He had yet to find out what Dumbledore had meant, though he thought it might have had something to do with the arrangements for him and Lilly. He kept catching Sirius and Mrs Weasley giving him curious looks. A few days before September the First, the lists for everyone else arrived and there was a great commotion with Ron being made Prefect.

"Who in their right mind would make _Ron_ a _prefect_?" Fred exclaimed in disbelief. Ted snorted. They all thought Harry would be made prefect, but he privately thought his fifteen-year-old god-father was far too distracted with other things. And that he attracted too much trouble. Lilly had made a game of coaxing out his and everyone's previous adventures and, though many of them weren't news, some were downright shocking.

"_You blackmailed Rita Skeeta?"_

"_Oh yes, and she was quite unhappy about it, I can tell you!"_

"_Seriously?"_

Still, he wasn't taking it very well. Reminded vividly of when Albus stole the seeker position from right underneath James, he decided to forgo the company and made his way downstairs.

The back of his neck prickled. He knew even before Dumbledore spoke that he was there once again.

* * *

She had the tact not to voice what was in her head.

_What is it with boys and having the biggest penis?_

She was privately surprised, sometimes, that they didn't just get it over with and measure. Ginny wasn't much of a help, either, since she was torn between her older brother and her – well, her _admirer _as Fred and George had taken to calling Harry. They'd made few steps towards actually being together, but she supposed they had to get used to the idea first. And she knew they weren't strictly speaking _supposed _to get together until half-way through the following year, so it was understandable.

Didn't stop her teasing.

In this, though, Ginny just agreed with the twins on both sides of the deprecating comments, leaving neither bloke with real allies. Except maybe Hermione. She sided with Ron. _And _they hadn't believed her when she said they'd end up together, _honestly!_

She ducked past Mrs Weasley as she crooned and went off to find Sirius. He'd probably laugh. She was starting to wonder what they would do for the intermittent months they would have to wait. It _had_ been on her mind, really, but she had belligerently pushed it back, even as Ted worried. He was too much of a worrier. She sometimes wondered if he wouldn't be happier if he could just sit back and enjoy things as they were for once. Not that it wasn't gratifying him being worried for her…_them_. He was so _broody_ sometimes. Mind you, he had always taken care of all of them like they were his blood siblings. And it wasn't that they _weren't_ family, it was just…

She shook her head of that confusing train of thought as she encountered Sirius in his room. He was looking unhappy too, though she thought she could understand that bit.

"James was never a prefect, either." He muttered distractedly. "It was Remus in our year."

"It was Ted in his." She came over to sit by him on the bed. Sirius looked up with a grin and shook his head.

"Sometimes it's eerie how alike they are." Then he sighed as if something weighed on his heart. "I wish –"

He broke off abruptly and jerked his head down.

"But, there it is anyway." He forced a smile back onto his face and forced himself to raise his head. "Has Molly told you yet?"

"Told me what?"

So Sirius did, and she ended up staring blankly at him for a few seconds before replying, "That's mental."

Sirius gave a sad laugh and shook his head.

"It's the best thing to do for you both."

"But what if we change things?"

"Just…try to stay out of major plot events, that's all."

"But…but…what's everyone going to say? I mean we're gonna stick out like sore thumbs, and how are you planning to explain our last names?"

"Dumbledore is sorting through the details. And it's not unheard of, coming in as new students. We had a girl called Amelia Halwitt come in in our third year because she'd been home schooled."

Lilly fell silent. It was mad, a truly _bonkers _idea – and no wonder he was upset about being left on his own.

"You'll be alright won't you?"

Sirius didn't answer, but lead them down for the get-together Mrs Weasley had organised. Ted was nowhere to be seen, but Mrs Weasley seemed to have broken the news to everyone else. It was like being shoved on a train to Blackpool: everything was lights and food and laughing, while at the same time the wold seemed to be speeding past. For the first time ever, she found it impossible to focus on the celebrations and merely kept her eyes peeled for the seventeen-year-old's lanky frame. The Proclaimers came on one the radio and she was distracted for a moment by the jovial, marching beat. She sang along, drowning the feeling of plunging along in the steady lyrics.

'_But I would walk five hundred miles, and I would walk five hundred more.'_

She twirled a little, spying Harry and Sirius pouring over an old photograph in the corner. Sirius looked up and beckoned to her, lifting the photo so she could see the assembled visage of the first Order of the Phoenix.

'_When I come home – when I come home, well I know I'm gonna be,_

_I'm gonna be the man who comes back home to you.'_

She saw Sirius with his short, if still shaggy hair, and her grandparents, smiling and waving out of the picture. They all looked so proud and happy, even in the midst of the war they were fighting.

'_And if I grow oo-old – when I grow oo-old, well I know I'm gonna be_

_I'm gonna be the man who's growing old with you.'_

She saw Remus and realised with shock and a feeling that settled in her stomach how much Ted really looked like a younger version of him. Same hair, same gait…

'_But I would walk five hundred miles, and I would walk five hundred more.'_

Sirius put an arm around the both of them.

* * *

"Mr Lupin?"

"Hmm?"

He'd been listening to the song, watching Lilly from the door.

"I do not wish to ask this of you, but I cannot but think you are the only man who could do it."

"Protect them all?" He murmured absently. "Keep an eye on them all?"

'_Just to be the man who walks a thousand miles to fall down at your door."_

Dumbledore sighed behind him, and he didn't need to meet the twinkling blue eyes to see them knowing. His head bowed, but he was smiling, in the end.

"Did you ever need to ask?"

* * *

**_A.N: K, the song is, obviously, I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles) by the Proclaimers and it is one of the few addictively catchy songs in existence that I actually don't mind going round in my head all day. I keep putting the cameos at the end don't I? Well the next one will be at the start, so that'll break the streak. But I like the way it loops back to the first thing you read..."The flower that blooms in adversity..." is from Mulan. Yes, I am THAT sad, but i think it's a nice quote anyway._**

**_What do yo think? Seriously, I don't like this chapter despite all the little bits in it I'm fond of! Review, my lovelys, review so I can make it better when I come back to edit it!_**


	10. The Boys Are Back In Town

_Sorry for the wait..._

**Chapter Nine**

_**The Boys Are Back In Town**_

It was a really, truly _mental_ idea. Fucking mental. In every way. Lilly just couldn't wrap her head around how Ted was taking it so well, considering how agitated he'd been about changing things. But then, everyone else seemed to think it was perfectly normal as well and she suddenly got the feeling he'd seen this coming.

So much for her noticing things.

Her heart kept going out to Sirius, but he maintained a mask of joviality as they went upstairs and got themselves together. Ted was quiet, looking as if something was weighing him down. Once or twice she caught him looking at her with an expression she couldn't quite read, unnerving her just a little. Not that he meant to make her feel uncomfortable, she was sure, but she was ever curious as to what he was thinking.

She sighed. _Too many thoughts. _One of the perils of that genius head of his, not that he ever listened to her when she said. Still…she couldn't shake the feeling that something was going on with him. Something_ profound_. Of course, his parents likely had something to do with it. She wondered how she would have reacted if she were meeting her mum and dad for the first time – not counting Ginny and Harry, really. I mean that was _big_, but had it changed her?

"Okay, so Dumbledore thinks it's easier if we just play into what everyone is going to think and pretend you're a Weasley."

She started at his sudden burst of conversation.

"I am a Weasley!"

"I, um, mean…your name. 'Cos we have to have different names, otherwise –"

"Yeah, yeah, I know what you mean. Go on."

"Right. So you'll just be Lilly Weasley and you've got the subjects you were going to do for OWL's anyway."

She folded socks into a pair.

"Right."

"And I'll be Ted Irving."

"Irving?"

"Yep."

Ted was almost twitching for some reason – as if he was nervous or embarrassed. Lilly stared at him for a moment, but couldn't for the life of her figure him out. 'Irving' wasn't such a bad name, although she was very fond of 'Lupin', always had been. She fought down a sigh with difficulty and snapped herself out of her trance.

"Okay…I can remember that. Anything else?"

"Nothing major." He shrugged. "Least, I don't think there's anything. The teachers will know, but obviously we can't just blurt it out in front of the rest of the students."

"Alright."

"You okay?"

He'd noticed her staring and now stared back, storm eyes burning into hers.

"Yeah, just…wow."

She threw the socks haphazardly into the trunk she'd borrowed off Tonks and went for the books. Grandma Weasley had obviously known beforehand and collected everything when she went to Diagon Alley, delivering them discreetly upstairs while she'd been occupied. Ted smiled suddenly when she rolled her eyes, a spark about him lighting up his face.

"Don't tell me you're _excited _about all of this?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Oh, 'Ted the Great Worrier', I dunno."

She smirked at the indignant look on his face.

"You should be packing too if we're ever going to get there, you know. Off with you!"

"Alright, alright, I'll stop bothering you."

He turned to leave.

"You weren't bothering me." She muttered quietly. She was certain he couldn't have heard, but he hesitated in the doorway for just a fraction of a second. As if he was going to turn back, but thought better of it. Had she wanted him to turn back?

_Never mind his head; it's yours that's the dangerous one._

She went to close the door when she heard muffled sobbing.

* * *

It was Harry. Harry's body. Harry's _dead_ body in the middle of the floor with blank eyes and blood pooling from the corner of his mouth. Ted was leaning heavily against the wall near the door and Mrs Weasley was backing away, her wand pointed at the corpse.

"Wh…" she couldn't even get the words out of her mouth. Mrs Weasley was close to screaming, wailing desperately as she tripped back, shaking her head desperately.

"Lilly."

Her head snapped to Ted who was at least winning the battle to stay calm, if not upright. Her brain was in free-fall and her heart pounded in her chest like a volley of gunfire. She felt her eyes go wide as she turned away to face him, barely able to contain the sudden, violent surge of panic.

_This couldn't be._

It was worse than in the forest when she had something to run from; somewhere to run _to_.

_Couldn't be._

Her breath caught badly. Her mouth hung open to pull in more, silently begging Ted to give her some sign. To do anything, everything, _something_. All he did in the end was look pointedly to his right, face pale but blessedly calm. She looked, mouth still open, to see another Harry – a very much _alive _one – sagging towards the floor on the other side of the door.

"DAD!"

She flung herself into his shell-shocked arms just as Remus and Sirius burst in. Sirius just stared at the floor as Remus rushed over to Mrs Weasley who was white as chalk. The shaggy-haired man looked as if he'd absorbed all the emotions she'd just escaped.

"What…?"

"Molly, it's alright."

"Least you got more of the sentence out." Ted muttered wryly. Sirius glanced back at him, face bloodless, but he said nothing as his gaze slid to where Lilly still clutched at Harry. She was more or less holding him upright now. Everyone turned to Remus as he made sure Mrs Weasley wasn't about to collapse and got rid of the boggart, a grim look on his face.

"Molly," Remus murmured. "Molly, it was just a boggart. Just a stupid boggart. Don't –"

But the next second she was sobbing her heart out onto his shoulder, hands clutching his jumper as if it were a life-line.

"I see them d-d-dead all the time!"

Lilly didn't know what to say as she slowly released Harry.

"All the t-t-time! I d-d-dream about it..."

Remus gently rubbed her back, giving a meaningful look to Sirius.

"D-don't tell Arthur. I d-d-don't want him to know." She gave an odd chuckle that sounded terrible as she pulled away. "B-being silly…"

"It's not silly." Sirius was shaking, his voice hoarse. Lilly stared at him in alarm, but again she didn't know what to do. It was Ted who unstuck himself from the wall to put a hand on his shoulder, causing Sirius to jerk and look wildly around.

"Look," he glanced around the room, and instantly Lilly felt better. "There's nothing wrong with fearing for the people you love. That's normal."

He stopped suddenly and frowned.

"Dad, do you think you could take Mrs Weasley for a cup of tea?"

Lilly's lips twitched into a faint smile and Sirius nodded jerkily.

"Yes. Tea. That's what you need."

"Oh, but I've j-just been s-s-so worried!"

"Shh, Molly –"

"Half the family's in the Order! It'll be a m-miracle if we all come through this... and P-P-Percy's not talking to us... What if something d-dreadful happens and we've never m- made it up with him? And –"

"It's going to be alright!" Ted said harshly. "This was never going to be bloodless, but you can't just…"

He looked away, and Lilly knew he was thinking about the blood that would be spilt before the end. About Bill being maimed, and Fred's death, and –

"It's going to be alright." He said more gently. "And Percy will come round. _Trust me._"

He took her hand and offered her a fresh handkerchief. She nodded blearily and let him and Remus steer her carefully out of the room. Lilly felt like she'd just landed after falling a long way – like the bottom of her stomach was still lost. Sirius was very quiet and snapped around to leave shortly afterwards.

"We should go after him."

"Lilly?"

"Come on." She took Harry's arm, dragged him from the room and pulled him up the stairs. She thought Sirius might have been in Buckbeak's room, but a glance into his bedroom revealed him perched on the edge of the four-poster, staring into space. He didn't seem to notice as they milled in the doorway. Harry looked awkwardly as though he was about to leave him be, but Lilly was having none of it.

Boys._ Honestly._

She strode boldly into the room and sat herself down next to Sirius, giving Harry a sharp look to follow her. Sirius glanced up when he shuffled in to sit on his other side, frowning slightly. She plunged on.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No."

Lilly cocked an eyebrow, unsurprised, and tried to motion to Harry to carry on. Her father looked mortified and cast a wild look around as if something in the room would give him inspiration. After an excessively awkward pause, his tongue landed on "Well that was weird."

Lilly stared at him for a moment, then shut her eyes and rolled them skyward. _Seriously?_

Sirius made a non-committal noise and continued to stare at the wall.

"Well, if you don't want to talk, fine, but don't…lock yourself away. Not from _us_, anyway."

His head snapped around.

"Lilly," he said very slowly and firmly. "It's fine."

"Well, obviously it isn't." Harry shifted uncomfortably. Sirius said nothing, but turned to him and seemed to battle with himself. Finally, he put an arm around Harry's far shoulder and a hand on his other. The look in his eyes was intense, desperate almost, but after a moment that lasted an age, he smiled gently.

"You don't ever have to worry about me, Harry. Either of you." He added, removing his hand and putting his other arm around Lilly. "It's _you_ that _I _worry about. I'll always worry about _you._ My job."

He stopped, something inscrutable passing over his face.

"Now, you two need to make sure you're ready for tomorrow." The arms turned to pushing them upright.

"Yeah," Harry turned and nodded. "Night, Sirius."

"Goodnight."

"Sirius?"

Lilly stopped in the doorway as Harry walked out. At least the man looked better, but there was still a heaviness about him, tempered a bit perhaps.

"Yes, Lilly?"

"If you ever do need to talk about it…"

He sighed, the emotion surging suddenly to the surface.

"Goodnight, Lilly." Was all he said.

* * *

"Fred? George?"

"Yes, young Theodore?"

"Why are you wearing those hoods?"

"Oh, we're just organising –"

"– a little ceremony."

Ted walked warily through the bedroom door.

"A ceremony for what?" He asked in a deadpan.

"We've had an idea."

"A very special idea."

"That a very special person –"

"– might join us making as much mischief as possible this year."

Ted raised an eyebrow.

"Mischief?"

"Certainly!" Fred indicated the third hooded robe laid out on the bed. "As the son of a Marauder –"

"– the only one in our year, anyway –"

"– you hereby receive an honorary invitation."

Ted stared.

"Are you trying to get me to join a cult?"

"No!"

"Whatever gave you that idea!"

"We're just asking you to swear your soul to mischief –"

"– on the holy document!"

"Did you ask Harry for that?"

He'd spotted the Marauder's map lying open but blank on the bedside table. George nodded.

"Got it off him after we found out you'd be joining us."

"So!" Ted leapt out of the way as the twins dragged the table into the middle of the floor and stood watching him expectantly.

"Well put on the robe, then!"

"_Ow_," Ted groaned and resignedly yanked it on. "This had better not take long. I've still got to pack!"

"It'll only take a minute!" George assured him as he drew his wand and indicated Ted should do the same. Fred joined and reverentially flourished the wand as if he were a grand priest.

"New disciple!" He cried. "You are hereby called to aid our quest in the eyes of our forerunners. Should you be deemed worthy, you will henceforth be…" He brought the wand down and paused dramatically. "…one of us!"

"Repeat after me." George intoned gravely. "And place your wand upon the holy document."

"Seriously?"

The twins sagged for a moment, looking miffed.

"Ted, the…spirit of things. Come on!"

"Oh alright, alright!"

He threw up his hands in defeat and they resumed their reverential stance.

"Repeat after me: 'I, Theodore Remus Lupin…'"

"I, Theodore Remus Lupin…"

"'Swear to be now, and hence ever more…'"

"Swear to be now, and hence ever more…"

"'Up to no good!'"

"Up to no good."

He struck the map with his wand as if it were a holy relic, rolling his eyes just a little. The map bloomed to life, ink spreading in shining tendrils over the surface. But it didn't reveal Hogwarts as he'd expected it to: it revealed a message from messers Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs.

'_Mr Prongs accepts Mr Lupin's most gracious application and offers his congratulations.'_

'_Mr Padfoot would like to add his vehement approval that Mr Lupin chose the right course in life.'_

'_Mr Moony registers his unreserved pride on the matter.'_

'_Mr Wormtail appreciates that someone of such high aptitude would be a great contribution to their cause.'_

Ted laughed.

"That's brilliant!"

"And so concludes the initiation of the disciple Theodore Remus Lupin!" Fred cried sombrely, but there was more than a hint of triumph in his voice. "Welcome, Ted, to our team!"

"And many happy returns!" George added, wringing his hand.

"_Riiiight._" He beamed despite himself and continued to laugh as he ripped off the robe and began throwing things into his father's old trunk. "So are there any immediate plans I should be aware of?"

"Oh ho! So hasty!"

"Why not just bask in the glory of the sacred cause?"

"Basking. Chuck us a shirt?"

Fred grinned.

* * *

Ginny avoided getting knocked down the stairs the next morning, but only because she leapt out of the way when Fred and Ted came tumbling past. Ted had berated the twins extensively for flippantly attempting (and botching) the locomotion on their trunks – only to trip over them himself and take Fred with him. George was in stitches whilst Ginny rushed to help.

"You three!" Mrs Weasley appeared out of nowhere to yell at them, and somewhere Ron groaned.

"Oh…three…"

"Just sunk in?" Lilly patted his back sympathetically. She'd found the radio again and turned up Thin Lizzy's greatest hits over the din with a smirk.

"Now, now don't dawdle! Lilly, shut that racket OFF! Boys, get out here NOW! Hurry up! Where's Harry? Oh and where's Sturgis, he should be here by now…"

"I maintain that the locomotion charm was not a failure!"

"You had no control over it!"

"It did what it was supposed to do, didn't it?"

"_Filthy half-breeds!_"

Mrs Black's screeches filled the hallway as they milled about in a state of absolute chaos, made worse when a bear-like black dog bounded over the luggage.

"Oh, for heaven's sake, Sirius, Dumbledore said _no!_"

The dog whined loudly and slumped against the nearest trunk.

"To be fair, he hasn't been let out all summer. And helping to rush off and find us at sunrise doesn't count." Ted got the brunt of her glare as Sirius barked appreciatively, but he held his ground. "He needs fresh air."

"Yeah, and what's the harm in him tagging along like this?" George scrunched the dog's ears.

"The harm? THE HARM? The _harm_ is he might very well be _spotted!_ And then –"

"Oh, give him a break, Molly!" Tonks rolled her eyes exasperatedly. "An hour in the sun can't hurt!"

"It will if he ends up back in Azkaban!"

But any further protests were cut short by Moody's finally agreeing that they would have to move without Sturgis Podmore and everyone pushing haphazardly through the front door.

"Lovely day, isn't it?" Tonks said brightly. Remus gave her a wry smile as the chaos of the hall spilled out with a series of bangs, crashes, screeches, curses and Mrs Weasley's chivvying. Lilly sighed as Ted raised an eyebrow at all the cars parked by the road. He seemed physically repelled by the fumes, though she supposed with his heightened senses it was understandable. He was at home with the wild, open spaces and the empty sky. He caught her looking and shrugged, but she knew him well enough. He was never born for cities.

"Come on, get a move on!" Mrs Weasley waved her arms about to try and move them along, pointedly _not _looking at Sirius.

"Come on," Ted smiled widely and strode boldly up the road. Lilly ambled along behind with a grunt, shooting a glare at his back. Why was he always the 'look lively' person?

"If only Arthur could have got us cars from the Ministry again…" Mrs Weasley said wistfully, looking at the convoy. "But Fudge won't let him borrow so much as an empty ink bottle these days."

"Someone should tell him," Fred panted. "To hurry up and get _out_ of denial!"

"What do you think Dumbledore's been doing?" Remus turned a wearied look back. Lilly scoffed and tried to scramble faster to catch up with Harry and Ron who were being entertained by Sirius. _He_ seemed to be having a whale of a time at least, bounding after everything that moved. The highlight came when he chased an excessively nonchalant looking cat over a wall. The almost-grin pulling his teeth was unnervingly un-dog-like as he padded smugly back to them, tail blurring.

"Don't suppose you ever tried that with Professor McGonagall?"

"No, but Mrs Norris was, shall we say, somewhat tormented by a mysterious dog in sixth year." Remus chuckled, shaking his head. "Filch ran himself ragged trying to catch him."

It took them nearly half an hour to reach the station and Mrs Weasley was getting frantic. Each of them was shoved unceremoniously through the barrier at the first opportunity, practically falling onto the platform. Lilly caught Ron before he slammed into George, but wasn't quick enough to save Ted who managed to floor-dive over his own feet before bouncing up looking sheepish.

"Alright, all of you," A whistle sounded as they collected themselves. "Be safe –"

"And remember to be careful what you put in writing." Moody appeared with a glare at his watch. "I'll still be reporting Sturgis to Dumbledore, that's the second time he's not turned up in a week."

"Well, good luck!" Tonks threw her arms around Ted. Lilly smiled as he shook off a second of shock and hugged back fiercely. Sirius made an odd chattering noise that she thought might have been laughter and she fell to her knees to hug him.

"Take care." She muttered in his ear. He nosed her eye in response, causing her to splutter a giggle. Then he gambled over to Harry just as a tall boy with dreds greeted Fred and George.

"Ah, Lee! Just the man! We have some news…"

"We'll try and get things cleared up as soon as possible." Remus appeared at her shoulder, smiling softly. "Be careful, now. And be good to him?" He tilted his head towards his son.

"_Well_, I can't promise…"

"Get a move on! You'll miss it! _Come on!_"

Still grinning, she danced up to give her granny a hug, before hauling Tonks' trunk up the step. Remus and Mr Weasley came to her rescue as the train began to move, and then they were all waving through the window, Sirius running madly along the platform. A bend in the track…and they were gone.

She stood staring at the window, unable to move. Suddenly she realised…it was all happening. _Really_ happening. And all around her everything looked the same…except _completely_ different.

"Do you think I should go and find Ted?"

"You mean rescue him from Fred and George?"

Ginny took her arm with a sympathetic look.

"He'll be fine. You stick with us."

Ron raised an eyebrow.

"Err…we are talking about the same Fred and George, right?"

"I count minor hearing damage as being fine."

* * *

"So, Lee Jordan."

"Theodore L-…Irving." Ted stuck out his hand with a slight wince.

"_Right_…" Lee looked sceptically over at the twins.

"It's alright. Ted's just undercover."

"Not very good at it yet."

"Oi!" Ted glanced behind him indignantly.

"So you're a spy, then?"

"No, I'm not James Bond."

"Who's –"

"It's just so that the ministry doesn't know who he _really_ is."

"Oh…" Now Lee was looking interested. "So, who are you…really?"

Ted relaxed his face into a wry smile.

"Can't say. I'd have to kill you."

"Not that that's an unfeasible option…"

"Haha! You'd better be careful of this one, Lee!"

"Fred!"

Lee just laughed, causing Ted to relax a bit further. He let loose the breath he hadn't realised he was holding and sunk back into the seat. It smelled weird. Everything smelled weird. It must have been the freshener they put into the upholsteries during the ninety's, but he had the oddest need to sneeze. And the engines sounded different.

_Must replace the third steam injector at some point, _he thought absently as Lee chatted away. Suddenly his name came up in the conversation again and he looked up.

"Hmm?"

"We were just saying how you were a genius."

"'m not a genius." He slouched back into the padding. "I'm just good at some stuff."

"Did you really get put up a year, or are they pulling my leg?"

Lee seemed bright with curiosity, as if he'd found some new and exciting creature. Well, he _had_ – but he didn't know that. Ted cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"They kind of did, yeah. In my second year."

"Where did you go then? What school – I mean, do they do it often there? And why are you transferring here?"

"Give the man time to breathe, Lee!"

But both the twins were looking nervously at Ted. He could spin Lee a story – it wouldn't be a very good story, but he could try. He could try and the dark-skinned youth opposite would know in an instant something wasn't right. He would ask, and Ted knew from experience that they would be more likely end up just having to tell him the truth. It had been the same with Dominic. So…go for partly true?

"I'm Hogwarts' special secret."

The charcoal eyes narrowed, eyebrows arched.

"_Okay_…so you're saying you've been here all the time?"

"No."

He smiled a little smugly as Lee gaped at him and sat back nonchalantly.

"Oh, come on, you've gotta give me something!"

"Wouldn't be much of a secret if I told you."

"_Oh_…he's got you there, mate!"

The twins were grinning from ear to ear.

"'course –"

"– _we_ know who he is –"

"– we were _allowed_ to know who he is."

"And how come you two are so special?"

"Dumbledore got the feeling they'd find out anyway so he made sure they knew _and_ knew to keep their mouths shut." Ted returned smoothly.

"Oh." Lee looked heavily disappointed. "So, _I_ can't know _anything?_"

"Nope."

"Sorry mate."

He slouched in his seat as Ted had done, looking despondent.

"But you are a genius, though?"

Ted sighed.

"In…a couple of things, maybe. Yes."

"Lee," Fred caught his friend's eye with a manic grin. "Lee…he's a potions genius!"

"I should be charging." Ted muttered, the corners of his mouth twitching.

* * *

Steam billowed around the station in clouds like cotton wool, flashing between brilliant white and deep black as they floated past the lamps. The night air was a relief after sitting in the compartment all day, and with the breeze floated the scent of highland pine. Closing his eyes briefly, Ted focussed on that smell – the smell that was familiar in any time – and found within it clean air, grass, water, and the spark of magic. Where he belonged.

One day, when he was old and wizened, he would come here again. He would come to the lochs and the hills and the fens and he would be home.

"You alright, Ted?"

He took a great breath through the nose before answering.

"Yeah. Can't you smell that?"

The twins looked at each other.

"What are we meant to smell?"

"Oh," Ted shook his head and smiled softly, lurching slightly as he manoeuvred his long legs onto the platform. "Nothing. Just…" He sighed happily. People around them gave him odd looks, but he couldn't care less.

"Ted?" Lee appeared behind him, but Fred grabbed his arm.

"Ted's having a happy moment."

Lee cast an apprehensive look between the two of them and Ted rolled his eyes.

"I'm just…glad to get out of the city, that's all. Fewer hydrocarbons out here."

"_Oh_," Lee relaxed completely and shook his head. "'Wizards for the Earth'…"

"Look, I don't have to be a hippy to want to live somewhere that doesn't have smoke and oil and rubbish everywhere!" He retorted hotly. "Anyway, _I _have a sensitive nose. It _stinks _in cities. Humans are disgusting!"

"Yeah…" Lee patted his shoulder sympathetically. "I know, I know, we're killing the planet."

"I just don't like cities."

"I hear you. In the meantime, don't we have a feast to go to?"

As they made their way up the drive, Ted found himself absently looking round for Lilly. He hadn't seen her all day…_stop it. _He snapped his head back, silently cursing. He did _not _miss her. Big brothers and best friends did _not _miss her after a few hours of her not being around. Maybe it had something to do with them being around each other every day for the last few weeks…but it had never been like that before after holidays, had it?

Fuck.

"We need to come up with subtitles."

"Or you could just swear like normal people."

Bristling, Ted splashed through the mud so he could walk ahead. They were almost at the carriages pulled by the ghostly thestrals when they rounded a bend and his eyes caught red hair.

"She still fancies you."

"Ron, you are so tactless!"

"Who still fancies him?"

The group spun as one to face them, Lilly's face splitting into a daylight-summoning grin.

"Hey, Ted! Still alive!"

"Just about."

His face was heating up before he decided he'd had enough. _He did not fancy his god-sister, he did not miss her after only a few hours and he DEFINITELY did not blush like a pubescent fourteen-year-old with his first crush._

With an effort, he bit back the rush of blood and adrenaline and forced himself to relax. He kept a cool head as she hugged him, asked gently if she was okay, and smiled as they started on getting into the carriage. Incident avoided.

"What horse things?"

Ted looked around to see Harry starring at the thestrals with Ron looking bewilderedly some way to their left.

"The horse things pulling the carriages!"

"They're called thestrals." He called down to them. "Harry can see them because he has a conscious memory of someone dying."

They stared at him, Ron looking dumbstruck whilst Harry seemed to stop dead. Suddenly Lilly hit him hard with her bag.

"What did I do?"

"You just beat Ron for tact." She hissed. _Oh._ He tried not to stare too much as the two clambered up and squashed themselves in, Harry suddenly looking very distant.

"Oh, Ted!" Hermione gestured from him to the two extra fifth years they seemed to have picked up. "This is Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood."

"Ted Irving."

He extended his hand to both of them, failing to keep a straight face as he abruptly recognised the youthful faces of his professors. His eyes slid to Lilly and her barely contained giggles before trying to turn his smirk into a proper smile.

"Hello Ted Irving." Luna said dreamily.

"'s not his real name." Lee leaned over with a wink. Everyone turned to stare at him. "What?"

"Ooh, are you a long lost descendant of the founders?" She asked suddenly, eyes alight.

"Err…I beg your pardon?"

"They live among us, you know. But they can't ever reveal their identities because then, of course, no one would stop _bothering _them!"

"Hey, Ted!" Fred seemed to be holding up George as he dissolved with laughter. "You should've just gone with that story!"

There was a smacking noise as his face hit his hands.

* * *

The rest of the journey up the sweeping drive was surprisingly uneventful, despite Fred and George's smirks in his direction. The stars were jewel bright in the absence of the city glow and he gazed at them for a long while through the others' conversations.

"What do you see up there, Theodore?"

"There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreampt of in your philosophy. And some you have to look hard to see."

"Well…I'm assuming stars."

Ted sighed. For all her clever ability to turn anything on its head, he did think Lilly lacked the finesse to quieten herself sometimes. And you needed to be quiet to stargaze because then you could truly _feel _without thinking. Looking around, he thought it might be a lost art.

"A phrase with 'wood' and 'trees' in it comes to mind, Lil." He muttered. _That _earned him a poke as the carriage drew to a halt. He dodged another one as they tumbled out of the coach, but was too slow – _him, a werewolf, too slow – _to stop her leaping onto his back and poking his spine.

"Ouch!"

"Gotcha."

He had to bite down the stupid grin that threatened to spread over his face as he shrugged her off.

"Come on you two." Ginny was frowning as she, Harry and Ron gazed towards the forest. Hermione shrugged and made to follow Neville and Luna, though she seemed troubled too.

"It's Hagrid." Lilly supplied quietly. "He wasn't on the platform, didn't you notice?"

"He's probably on a job." Ted steered her into the crowd and gave her a pointed look.

"What job?"

Harry and Ron had joined them and both were looking anxious.

"Like one of the ones where he went to look for the giants?" Lilly looked at him for confirmation and he resisted the urge to roll his eyes. She'd said it quietly enough as the students bustled around them, but –

"Not here." He muttered and turned firmly away.

"You're never going to stop them from being curious." George looked over his shoulder as he caught up. "Four years of jeopardy-friendly haven't done that."

"Dumbledore did ask me to look after them, though."

Fred raised his eyebrows from his other side as Ted shrugged; a movement far lighter than what he felt.

"Really?"

"Yep."

There was silence as they passed under the lintel of the front doors and into the comparative gleam of the entrance hall. Peeves seemed to be hovering half way up the grand staircase, but by the looks of things he was planning something for later rather than immediate havoc. The trio stopped in the middle as they waited for Lee – who had been way-laid by Angelina and Katie.

"See her?"

Fred pointed to Angelina.

"She's my girl."

Ted appraised her luxurious black hair and the mahogany skin with just the slightest tint of red; her doe-brown eyes and cunning eyebrows matched to the elegant cheek-bones and full lips. Yes, she was pretty. Very pretty in fact.

"Yeah, and how many times did she turn you down before the ball last year?" George grinned at his twin who looked, for a moment, completely distracted.

"Hmm?"

"Ted," Georged turned to him suddenly. "You know if Dumbledore said look after them, I'm sure he didn't mean you had to do it on your own."

"Yeah," Fred wrenched his gaze away from Angelina. "We're all together, mate. We know how much you like hunting down death eaters on your own, but if we can do anything to help you just need to say."

"And we'll give you the bill."

* * *

The Great Hall seemed to shimmer as they made their way to the Gryffindor table, the hundreds of floating candles setting a glow over the darkened wood. The fifth-years were giving her furtively curious glances as Lilly sat down, but she shrugged them off. She'd always had curious glances. It was the whispering and hostile muttering that followed her sitting next to Harry that got her teeth on edge.

"Wish James was here." She murmered gloomily to Ron on her other side. "He'd be quick to tell them to keep their mouths shut."

Ron 'hmm'ed in agreement as they watched the sorting hat being carried into the hall. Everyone fell quiet as it began to sing. The eerie chant of the hat in its low, ancient voice was about unity, and loyalty, and the strength of those that stand together. It was like nothing she had ever heard from the hat before, though she'd been half expecting it. It rang with something deep, though most of the students looked confused. She flicked her eyes to Ted who was resting his head in one hand, storm eyes grave. He looked as if he would dearly love to say something more, but knew better than to try. Quite suddenly, she had the urge to take hold of his other hand. Out of nowhere. It was so shocking, she turned sharply away, fighting a blush.

_Why had she wanted to do that?_

The hat was nearing the end of its song and she tried to concentrate on it, but failed miserably. The last few lines made it through the confused-panic fog, but she didn't pay them much attention.

"_And we must unite inside her_

_Or we'll crumble from within_

_Our heads bowed with the heavy past_

_Must rise from the din_

_To change what die is cast_

_Or surely perish with our kin _

_I have told you, I have warned you..._

_Now let the Sorting begin."_

"Alea jacta est." Ted said quietly.

"What?"

"'The die is cast.'"

"Oh." She hadn't considered that connection. Ron still looked confused.

"I don't get it?"

"It's what Julius Caesar supposedly said when he crossed the Rubicon on his march to Rome." Ted ran a hand over his scalp, wilding his hair. "It marked the point of no return, I think, and the inevitable start of the civil war he made against the republic's senate. The war he won, of course, but that was when he set the pages of history for it to be so. Like…one of those moments that changes the world."

"Shh!"

They all looked up to Hermione who seemed to bristle at the fact they were talking through the sorting. With more than one eye-roll, they turned their attention back to the head of the hall. The line of nervous first years gradually thinned, with the occasional name recognised from somewhere. Lilly had to suppress a gasp when Rose Zeller was sorted. Her written accounts as a third-year under Voldemort's regime were amazing – the fear, the bravery; reaching out to the ordinary people in the aftermath of the Second Wizarding War. There was hardly a witch or wizard in England who didn't know her book, and there she was: a small, pale eleven-year-old.

Ready to be a less-small, less-pale, spottier thirteen-year-old. Lilly stifled a giggle.

With her the sorting was finally finished, and Dumbledore stood up.

"To our newcomers, welcome! To our old hands – welcome back! There is a time for speech-making, but this is not it. Tuck in!"

It was strange, being welcomed by Dumbledore. It wasn't an experience she'd ever had before, though every other student took it for granted. Eerie and comforting at the same time. She shook her head slightly, before turning her attention to the food. Ron, Harry and Hermione were in conversation with Nearly-Headless-Nick, and Ted with Fred, George and Lee, so she took the opportunity to help herself to some roast chicken and buttered mushrooms. Ginny smiled at her from a little way down the table, and she smiled back, eyes slipping to a good-looking, dark-skinned boy sitting next to her. She raised an eyebrow at him as their eyes met, instantly mischievous, before turning back to her plate.

_Oh,_ maybe this would be more fun than she'd thought.

The feast was over, Dumbledore had stood up – and been interrupted. The famous incident with Umbridge that was talked about for years afterwards. The speech that had most bored to tears, though some in tears of either outrage or worship (it varied) and she tried her best not to listen. She caught Ted's eye and watched him sink to the table with a sigh.

"_Let us move forward, then, into a new era of openness, effectiveness and accountability…"_

_There'll be accountability, alright, _Lilly thought with a sense of savage satisfaction, _they'll see what you really are and then…_

"Yes, that was certainly illuminating." Hermione muttered darkly. Ron spluttered.

"You're not telling me you enjoyed it?"

"I said illuminating, not enjoyable. It explained a lot."

"Did it? Sounded like a load of waffle to me." Harry turned to frown at the way Lilly was grinning.

"There was some important stuff hidden in the _waffle_."

"Oh yeah, the ministry's trying to interfere with the goings on at Hogwarts." Lilly got up elegantly as the school was dismissed, shooting another smile at the boy formally next to Ginny.

"Interfering?"

"Um, yeah?" She made her way over to the boy and extended a hand. "Hi! Lilly Weasley, at your service."

* * *

_**A.N: So...the song was more in the middle than at the start, but I had a couple of ideas that went before it so it ended up being pushed back. Anyway, it's obviously The Boys Are Back In Town by Thin Lizzy. Great song, and I thought it was very appropriate for Fred, George and Ted. The name Irving is actually legitimate, but I did see it first in Dragon Age (Origins), so I admit the game influenced the decision. I didn't give them alternate first names because that rarely works in this situation and it was appropriate to give them something normal people wouldn't have to worry about too much. And cos it's annoying in books.**_

_**I wasn't going to put the boggart in, but it was too good of an opportunity for Sirius' character to pass up. I like the way that went, anyway. The scene with the hooded robes was inspired by How I Met Your Mother and them swearing on the Bro-Code, but it grew mostly from my own stuff. I've use a lot of the book in the second half of it, but I've been careful to add in a lot of my own stuff too, again in an attempt NOT to just re-write the scenes. **_

_**Ha - oh, I did start this ages ago. I mean AGES, but I couldn't quite finish it. It always just came along in trickles and drips, but I actually like the way it's turned out, long as it is. Gets through a few things, which is always good as far as a story is concerned. Again, thank you for all those who've reviewed. I've got stuff planned, but see I was writing a lot of the other stuff whilst listening to Steven Fry's audio CDs of the book and it's much harder to write for this when I'm not listening to the original lines. Fear not, however! I plan to listen to them again!**_

_**My sweet reviewers, oh, my sweet reviewers! Keep them coming, my love, they're always so nice!**_


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